2O      •    i*  i  fi  8  «ni_  L- 


If  any  one  alive,"  he    cried,    "knows  any  cause  why  this 
thing  should  not  be  " 


KINCAID'S 
BATTERY 


BY 

GEORGE  W.  CABLE 


ILLUSTRATED   BY 

ALONZO     KIMBALL 


CHARLES  SCRIBNER'S  SONS 
NEW  YORK   ::    ::    ::    ::    ::    1908 


COPTBIOHT,   1908,  BT 

CHARLES  SCRIBNER'S  SONS 


Published  November,  1908 


E.  C.  S.  C. 


247955 


CONTENTS 

Chapter  Page 

I.  Carrollton  Gardens I 

II.  Carriage  Company 7 

III.  The  General's  Choice       10 

IV.  Manoeuvres 16 

V.  Hilary?— Yes,  Uncle?       21 

VI.  Messrs.  Smellemout  and  Ketchem      ....  24 

VII.  By  Starlight 27 

VHL  One  Killed 33 

IX.  Her  Harpoon  Strikes 37 

X.  Sylvia  Sighs 41 

XI.  In  Column  of  Platoons     .    .     .     .     .     .     ,     .  47 

XII.  Mandeville  Bleeds 54 

XIII.  Things  Anna  Could  Not  Write 62 

XIV.  Flora  Taps  Grandma's  Cheek 66 

XV.  The  Long  Month  of  March 70 

XVI.  Constance  Tries  to  Help       76 

vii 


Contents 

Chapter  Page 

XVII.  "Oh,  Connie,  Dear— Nothing— Go  On"    .    .    78 

XVIII.  Flora  Tells  the  Truth! 83 

XIX.  Flora  Romances  87 

XX.  The  Fight  for  the  Standard  94 

XXI.  Constance  Cross-Examines 101 

XXII.     Same  Story  Slightly  Warped 105 

XXIII.  "Soldiers!" 112 

XXIV.  Can  a  Parked  Battery  Raise  a  Dust?      .     .     .117 
XXV.     "He  Must  Wait,"  Says  Anna 121 

XXVI.     Swift  Going,  Down  Stream 126 

XXVII.     Hard  Going,  Up  Stream 131 

XXVIII.    The  Cup  of  Tantalus       137 

XXIX.    A  Castaway  Rose 143 

XXX.     Good-by,  Kincaid's  Battery       150 

XXXI.  Virginia  Girls  and  Louisiana  Boys     ....  160 

XXXII.    Manassas 165 

XXXIII.  Letters 169 

XXXIV.  A  Free-Gift  Bazaar 175 

XXXV.  The  "Sisters  of  Kincaid's  Battery"    .     .     .     .  180 

XXXVI.     Thunder-Cloud  and  Sunburst 183 

viii 


Contents 

Chapter  P**6 

XXXVII.  "Till  He  Said,  Tm  Come  Hame,  My  Love'"  189 

XXXVIII.    Anna's  Old  Jewels       106 

XXXIX.     Tight  Pinch 201 

XL.    The  License,  The  Dagger 206 

XLI.     For  an  Emergency        211 

XLII.     "Victory!    I  Heard  it  as  PI'—" 221 

XLIII.    Sabbath  at  Shiloh 229 

XLIV.     "They  Were  all  Four  Together" 234 

XLV.     Steve — Maxime — Charlie — 238 

XLVI.     The  School  of  Suspense 247 

XLVII.     From  the  Burial  Squad 251 

XLVIII.    Farragut 256 

XLIX.     A  City  in  Terror .     .  261 

L.     Anna  Amazes  Herself       267 

LI.     The  Callender  Horses  Enlist 272 

LII.     Here  They  Come! 278 

LIII.     Ships,  Shells,  and  Letters 284 

LIV.    Same  April  Day  Twice 290 

LV.    In  Darkest  Dixie  and  Out 297 

LVI.    Between  the  Millstones 3°4 

ix 


Contents 

Chapter  Page 

LVII.  Gates  of  Hell  and  Glory  308 

LVIII.  Arachne 314 

LIX.  In  a  Labyrinth 320 

LX.  Hilary's  Ghost 324 

LXL    The  Flag-of-Truce  Boat 329 

LXIL  Farewell,  Jane! 338 

LXni.  The  Iron-clad  Oath 343 

LXIV.  "Now,  Mr.  Brick-Mason—" 347 

LXV.  Flora's  Last  Throw 354 

LXVI.  "When  I  Hands  in  My  Checks" 362 

LXVn.  Mobile 365 

LXVIII.  By  the  Dawn's  Early  Light 371 

LXIX.  Southern  Cross  and  Northern  Star  ....  377 

LXX.  Gains  and  Losses 384 

LXXI.  Soldiers  of  Peace 390 


X 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


"If  any  one  alive,"  he  cried,  "knows  any  cause  why  this 
thing  should  not  be"       Frontispiece 

Facing 
page 

Anna 10 


"'Tis  good-by,  Kincaid's  Battery"        142 

And  the  next  instant  she  was  in  his  arms 194 

"No!  not  under  this  roof— nor  in  sight  of  these  things"  .  254 
"You  'ave  no  ri-ight  to  leave  me!  Ah,  you  shall  not  I"  .  326 
She  dropped  into  a  seat,  staring  like  one  demented  .  .  .362 


Kincaid's  Battery 


CARROLLTON   GARDENS 

FOR  the  scene  of  this  narrative  please  take  into 
mind  a  wide  quarter-circle  of  country,  such  as  any  of 
the  pretty  women  we  are  to  know  in  it  might  have 
covered  on  the  map  with  her  half-opened  fan. 

Let  its  northernmost  corner  be  Vicksburg,  the  famous, 
on  the  Mississippi.  Let  the  easternmost  be  Mobile, 
and  let  the  most  southerly  and  by  far  the  most  im 
portant,  that  pivotal  corner  of  the  fan  from  which  all 
its  folds  radiate  and  where  the  whole  pictured  thing 
opens  and  shuts,  be  New  Orleans.  Then  let  the  grave 
moment  that  gently  ushers  us  in  be  a  long-ago  after 
noon  in  the  Louisiana  Delta. 

Throughout  that  land  of  water  and  sky  the  willow 
clumps  dotting  the  bosom  of  every  sea-marsh  and 
fringing  every  rush-rimmed  lake  were  yellow  and  green 
in  the  full  flush  of  a  new  year,  the  war  year,  'Sixty-one. 

Though  rife  with  warm  sunlight,  the  moist  air  gave 
distance  and  poetic  charm  to  the  nearest  and  hum 
blest  things.  At  the  edges  of  the  great  timbered 
swamps  thickets  of  young  winter-bare  cypresses  were 
budding  yet  more  vividly  than  the  willows,  while  in 
the  depths  of  those  overflowed  forests,  near  and  far 


KincaicTs  Battery 

down  their  lofty  gray  colonnades,  the  dwarfed  swamp- 
maple  drooped  the  winged  fruit  of  its  limp  bush  in 
pink  and  flame-yellow  and  rose-red  masses  until  it 
touched  its  own  image  in  the  still  flood. 

That  which  is  now  only  the  " sixth  district"  o' 
greater  New  Orleans  was  then  the  small  separate  town 
of  Carrollton.  There  the  vast  Mississippi,  leaving  the 
sugar  and  rice  fields  of  St.  Charles  and  St.  John  Bap 
tist  parishes  and  still  seeking  the  Gulf  of  Mexico,  turns 
from  east  to  south  before  it  sweeps  northward  and 
southeast  again  to  give  to  the  Creole  capital  its  graceful 
surname  of  the  "  Crescent  City."  Mile-wide,  brimful, 
head-on  and  boiling  and  writhing  twenty  fathoms  deep, 
you  could  easily  have  seen,  that  afternoon,  why  its 
turfed  levee  had  to  be  eighteen  feet  high  and  broad  in 
proportion.  So  swollen  was  the  flood  that  from  any 
deck  of  a  steamboat  touching  there  one  might  have 
looked  down  upon  the  whole  fair  still  suburb. 

Widely  it  hovered  in  its  nest  of  rose  gardens,  orange 
groves,  avenues  of  water-oaks,  and  towering  moss- 
draped  pecans.  A  few  hundred  yards  from  the  levee  a 
slender  railway,  coming  from  the  city,  with  a  highway 
on  either  side,  led  into  its  station-house;  but  mainly 
the  eye  would  have  dwelt  on  that  which  filled  the  in 
terval  between  the  nearer  high  road  and  the  levee — the 
"Carrollton  Gardens." 

At  a  corner  of  these  grounds  closest  to  the  railway 
station  stood  a  quiet  hotel  from  whose  eastern  veranda 
it  was  but  a  step  to  the  centre  of  a  sunny  shell-paved 
court  where  two  fountains  danced  and  tinkled  to  each 
other.  Along  its  farther  bound  ran  a  vine-clad  fence 
where  a  row  of  small  tables  dumbly  invited  the  flushed 


Carrollton  Gardens 

visitor  to  be  inwardly  cooled.  By  a  narrow  gate  in  this 
fence,  near  its  townward  end,  a  shelled  walk  lured  on 
into  a  musky  air  of  verdurous  alleys  that  led  and  misled, 
crossed,  doubled,  and  mazed  among  flowering  shrubs 
from  bower  to  bower.  Out  of  sight  in  there  the  loiterer 
came  at  startling  moments  face  to  face  with  banks  of 
splendid  bloom  in  ravishing  negligee — -Diana  disrobed, 
as  it  were,  while  that  untiring  sensation-hunter,  the 
mocking-bird,  leaped  and  sang  and  clapped  his  wings 
in  a  riot  of  scandalous  mirth. 

In  the  ground-floor  dining-room  of  that  unanimated 
hotel  sat  an  old  gentleman  named  Brodnax,  once  of 
the  regular  army,  a  retired  veteran  of  the  Mexican  war, 
and  very  consciously  possessed  of  large  means.  He 
sat  quite  alone,  in  fine  dress  thirty  years  out  of  fashion, 
finishing  a  late  lunch  and  reading  a  newspaper;  a 
trim,  hale  man  not  to  be  called  old  in  his  own  hearing. 
He  had  read  everything  intended  for  news  or  entertain 
ment  and  was  now  wandering  in  the  desert  of  the  ad 
vertising  columns,  with  his  mind  nine  miles  away,  at 
the  other  end  of  New  Orleans. 

Although  not  that  person  whom  numerous  men  of 
his  acquaintance  had  begun  affectionately  to  handicap 
with  the  perilous  nickname  of  "the  ladies'  man,"  he 
was  thinking  of  no  less  than  five  ladies;  two  of  one 
name  and  three  of  another.  Flora  Valcour  and  her 
French  grandmother  (as  well  as  her  brother  of  nine 
teen,  already  agog  to  be  off  in  the  war)  had  but  lately 
come  to  New  Orleans,  from  Mobile.  On  a  hilly 
border  of  that  smaller  Creole  city  stood  the  home  they 
had  left,  too  isolated,  with  war  threatening,  for  women 
to  occupy  alone.  Mrs.  Callender  was  the  young  widow 

3 


Kincaid's  Battery 

of  this  old  bachelor's  life-long  friend,  the  noted  judge  of 
that  name,  then  some  two  years  deceased.  Constance 
and  Anna  were  her  step-daughters,  the  latter  (if  you 
would  believe  him)  a  counterpart  of  her  long-lost, 
beautiful  mother,  whose  rejection  of  the  soldier's  suit, 
when  he  was  a  mere  lieutenant,  was  the  well-known 
cause  of  his  singleness.  These  Callender  ladies, 
prompted  by  him  and  with  a  sweet  modesty  of  quiet 
ness,  had  just  armed  a  new  field  battery  with  its  six 
splendid  brass  guns,  and  it  was  around  these  three 
Callenders  that  his  ponderings  now  hung;  especially 
around  Anna  and  in  reference  to  his  much  overprized 
property  and  two  nephews:  Adolphe  Irby,  for  whom 
he  had  obtained  the  command  of  this  battery,  which  he 
was  to  see  him  drill  this  afternoon,  and  Hilary  Kincaid, 
who  had  himself  cast  the  guns  and  who  was  to  help  the 
senior  cousin  conduct  these  evolutions. 

The  lone  reader's  glance  loitered  down  a  long  row  of 
slim  paragraphs,  each  beginning  with  the  same  wee 
picture  of  a  steamboat  whether  it  proclaimed  the 
Grand  Duke  or  the  Louis  d'Or,  the  Ingomar  bound  for 
the  "Lower  Coast,"  or  the  Natchez  for  "Vicksburg 
and  the  Bends."  Shifting  the  page,  he  read  of  the 
Swiss  Bell-Ringers  as  back  again  "after  a  six  years' 
absence,"  and  at  the  next  item  really  knew  what  he 
read.  It  was  of  John  Owens'  appearance,  every  night, 
as  Caleb  Plummer  in  "Dot,"  "performance  to  begin  at 
seven  o'clock."  Was  it  there  Adolphe  would  this 
evening  take  his  party,  of  which  the  dazzling  Flora 
would  be  one  and  Anna,  he  hoped,  another?  He  had 
proposed  this  party  to  Adolphe,  agreeing  to  bear  its 
whole  cost  if  the  nephew  would  manage  to  include  in 

4 


Carrollton  Gardens 

it  Anna  and  Hilary.  And  Irby  had  duly  reported  com 
plete  success  and  drawn  on  him,  but  the  old  soldier 
still  told  his  doubts  to  the  newspaper. 

"Adolphe  has  habits,"  he  meditated,  "but  success 
is  not  one  of  them." 

Up  and  down  a  perpendicular  procession  on  the 
page  he  every  now  and  then  mentally  returned  the 
salute  of  the  one  little  musketeer  of  the  same  height  as 
the  steamboat's  chimneys,  whether  the  Attention  he 
challenged  was  that  of  the  Continentals,  the  Louisiana 
Grays,  Orleans  Cadets,  Crescent  Blues  or  some  other 
body  of  blithe  invincibles.  Yet  his  thought  was  still 
of  Anna.  When  Adolphe,  last  year,  had  courted  her, 
and  the  hopeful  uncle  had  tried  non-intervention,  she 
had  declined  him — "and  oh,  how  wisely!"  For  then 
back  to  his  native  city  came  Kincaid  after  years  away 
at  a  Northern  military  school  and  one  year  across  the 
ocean,  and  the  moment  the  uncle  saw  him  he  was  glad 
Adolphe  had  failed.  But  now  if  she  was  going  to  find 
Hilary  as  light-headed  and  cloying  as  Adolphe  was 
thick-headed  and  sour,  or  if  she  must  see  Hilary  go 
soft  on  the  slim  Mobile  girl — whom  Adolphe  was  al 
ready  so  torpidly  enamored  of — "H-m-m-m!" 

Two  young  men  who  had  tied  their  horses  behind 
the  hotel  crossed  the  white  court  toward  the  garden. 
They  also  were  in  civil  dress,  yet  wore  an  air  that  goes 
only  with  military  training.  The  taller  was  Hilary 
Kincaid,  the  other  his  old-time,  Northern-born-and- 
bred  school  chum,  Fred  Greenleaf.  Kincaid,  coming 
home,  had  found  him  in  New  Orleans,  on  duty  at 
Jackson  Barracks,  and  for  some  weeks  they  had  en 
joyed  cronying.  Now  they  had  been  a  day  or  two 

5 


Kincaid's  Battery 

apart  and  had  chanced  to  meet  again  at  this  spot. 
Kincaid,  it  seems,  had  been  looking  at  a  point  hard  by 
with  a  view  to  its  fortification.  Their  manner  was 
frankly  masterful  though  they  spoke  in  guarded  tones. 

"No,"  said  Kincaid,  "you  come  with  me  to  this 
drill.  Nobody'll  take  offence." 

"Nor  will  you  ever  teach  your  cousin  to  handle  a 
battery,"  replied  Greenleaf,  with  a  sedate  smile. 

"Well,  he  knows  things  we'll  never  learn.  Come 
with  me,  Fred,  else  I  can't  see  you  till  theatre's  out — 
if  I  go  there  with  her — and  you  say " 

"Yes,  I  want  you  to  go  with  her,"  murmured  Green- 
leaf,  so  solemnly  that  Kincaid  laughed  outright. 

"But,  after  the  show,  of  course,"  said  the  laugher, 
"you,  and  I'll  ride,  eh?"  and  then  warily,  "You've 
taken  your  initials  off  all  your  stuff?  .  .  .  Yes,  and 
Jerry's  got  your  ticket.  He'll  go  down  with  your 
things,  check  them  all  and  start  off  on  the  ticket  him 
self.  Then,  as  soon  as  you " 

"But  will  they  allow  a  slave  to  do  so?" 

"  With  my  pass,  yes ;  '  Let  my  black  man,  Jerry ' " 

The  garden  took  the  pair  into  its  depths  a  moment 
too  soon  for  the  old  soldier  to  see  them  as  he  came  out 
upon  the  side  veranda  with  a  cloud  on  his  brow  that 
showed  he  had  heard  his  nephew's  laugh. 


Carriage  Company 
II 

CARRIAGE    COMPANY 

BAREHEADED  the  uncle  crossed  the  fountained  court, 
sat  down  at  a  table  and  read  again.  In  the  veranda  a 
negro,  his  own  slave,  hired  to  this  hotel,  held  up  an 
elegant  military  cap,  struck  an  inquiring  attitude,  and 
called  softly,  "Gen'al?" 

"Bring  it  with  the  coffee." 

But  the  negro  instantly  brought  it  without  the  coffee 
and  placed  it  on  the  table  with  a  delicate  flourish, 
shuffled  a  step  back  and  bowed  low: 

"Coffee  black,  Gen'al,  o'  co'se?" 

"Black  as  your  grandmother." 

The  servant  tittered:  "Yas,  suh,  so  whah  it  flop 
up-siden  de  cup  it  leave  a  lemon-yalleh  sta-ain." 

He  capered  away,  leaving  the  General  to  the  little 
steamboats  and  to  a  blessed  ignorance  of  times  to  be 
when  at  "Vicksburg  and  the  Bends"  this  same  waiter 
would  bring  his  coffee  made  of  corn-meal  bran  and 
muddy  water,  with  which  to  wash  down  scant  snacks 
of  mule  meat.  The  listless  eye  still  roamed  the  arid 
page  as  the  slave  returned  with  the  fragrant  pot  and 
cup,  but  now  the  sitter  laid  it  by,  lighted  a  cigar  and 
mused : — 

In  this  impending  war  the  South  would  win,  of  course 
— oh,  God  is  just!  But  this  muser  could  only  expect 
to  fall  at  the  front.  Then  his  large  estate ,  all  lands  and 
slaves,  five  hundred  souls — who  would  inherit  that  and 
hold  it  together  ?  Held  together  it  must  be !  Any  par 
tition  of  it  would  break  no  end  of  sacredly  humble 

7 


Kincaid's  Battery 

household  and  family  ties  and  work  spiritual  havoc 
incalculable.  There  must  be  but  one  heir.  Who? 
Hilary's  mother  had  been  in  heaven  these  many  years, 
the  mother  of  Adolphe  eighteen  months;  months  quite 
enough  to  show  the  lone  brother  how  vast  a  loss  is  the 
absence  of  the  right  mistress  from  such  very  human  in 
terests  as  those  of  a  great  plantation.  Not  only  must 
there  be  but  one  heir,  but  he  must  have  the  right  wife. 

The  schemer  sipped.  So  it  was  Anna  for  Hilary  if 
he  could  bring  it  about.  So,  too,  it  must  be  Hilary  for 
his  adjutant -general,  to  keep  him  near  enough  to  teach 
him  the  management  of  the  fortune  coming  to  him  if 
he,  Hilary,  would  only  treat  his  kind  uncle's  wishes — 
reasonably.  With  the  cup  half  lifted  he  harkened. 
From  a  hidden  walk  and  bower  close  on  the  garden 
side  of  this  vine-mantled  fence  sounded  footsteps  and 
voices : 

"But,  Fred!  where  on  earth  did  she  get — let's  sit  in 
here — get  that  rich,  belated,  gradual  smile?" 

A  memory  thrilled  the  listening  General.  "From 
her  mother,"  thought  he,  and  listened  on. 

"It's  like,"  continued  his  nephew —  "I'll  tell  you 
what  it's  like.  It's  like —  Now,  let  me  alone !  You  see, 
one  has  to  learn  her  beauty — by  degrees.  You  know, 
there  is  a  sort  of  beauty  that  flashes  on  you  at  first 
sight,  like — like  the  blaze  of  a  ball-room.  I  was  just 
now  thinking  of  a  striking  instance " 

"From  Mobile?    You  always  are." 

"No  such  thing!  Say,  Fred,  I'll  tell  you  what  Miss 
Anna's  smile  is  like.  It's  as  if  you  were  trying — say  in 
a  telescope — for  a  focus,  and  at  last  all  at  once  it  comes 
and — there's  your  star!" 

8 


Carriage  Company 

The  Northerner  softly  assented. 

"Fred!    Fancy  Flora  Valcour  with  that  smile!" 

"No!  Hilary  Kincaid,  I  think  you  were  born  to 
believe  in  every  feminine  creature  God  ever  made.  No 
wonder  they  nickname  you  as  they  do.  Now,  some 
girls  are  quite  too  feminine  for  me." 

In  his  own  smoke  the  General's  eyes  opened  aggres 
sively.  But  hark!  His  nephew  spoke  again: 

"  Fred,  if  you  knew  all  that  girl  has  done  for  that  boy 
and  that  grandmother —  It  may  sound  like  an  over 
statement,  but  you  must  have  observed " 

"That  she's  a  sort  of  overstatement  herself?" 

"  Go  to  grass !  Your  young  lady's  not  even  an  under 
statement;  she's  only  a  profound  pause.  See  here! 
what  time  is  it?  I  prom " 

On  the  uncle's  side  of  the  fence  a  quick  step  brought 
a  newcomer,  a  Creole  of  maybe  twenty-nine  years, 
member  of  his  new  staff,  in  bright  uniform : 

"Ah,  General,  yo'  moze  ob-edient!  Never  less  al- 
lone  then  when  al-lone  ?  JT  is  the  way  with  myseff " 

He  seemed  not  unrefined,  though  of  almost  too  met 
tlesome  an  eye;  in  length  of  leg  showing  just  the  lack, 
in  girth  of  waist  just  the  excess,  to  imply  a  better  dignity 
on  horseback  and  to  allow  a  proud  tailor  to  prove  how 
much  art  can  overcome.  Out  on  the  road  a  liveried 
black  coachman  had  halted  an  open  carriage,  in  which 
this  soldier  had  arrived  with  two  ladies.  Now  these 
bowed  delightedly  from  it  to  the  General,  while  Kin 
caid  and  his  friend  stood  close  hid  and  listened  agape, 
equally  amused  and  dismayed. 

"How  are  you,  Mandeville?"  said  the  General.  "I 
am  not  nearly  as  much  alone  as  I  seem,  sir!" 


KincaicTs  Battery 

A  voice  just  beyond  the  green-veiled  fence  cast  a 
light  on  this  reply  and  brought  a  flush  to  the  Creole's 
very  brows.  "Alas!  Greenleaf,"  it  cried,  "we  search 
in  vain!  He  is  not  here!  We  are  even  more  alone 
than  we  seem!  Ah!  where  is  that  peerless  chevalier, 
my  beloved,  accomplished,  blameless,  sagacious,  just, 
valiant  and  amiable  uncle?  Come  let  us  press  on. 
Let  not  the  fair  sex  find  him  first  and  snatch  him  from 
us  forever!" 

The  General's  scorn  showed  only  in  his  eyes  as  they 
met  the  blaze  of  Mandeville's.  "You  were  about  to 
remark — ?"  he  began,  but  rose  and  started  toward  the 
carriage. 

There  not  many  minutes  later  you  might  have  seen 
the  four  men  amicably  gathered  and  vying  in  clever 
speeches  to  pretty  Mrs.  Callender  and  her  yet  fairer 
though  less  scintillant  step-daughter  Anna. 

Ill 

THE  GENERAL'S  CHOICE 

ANNA  CALLENDER.  In  the  midst  of  the  gay  skirmish 
and  while  she  yielded  Greenleaf  her  chief  attention, 
Hilary  observed  her  anew. 

What  he  thought  he  saw  was  a  golden-brown  profu 
sion  of  hair  with  a  peculiar  richness  in  its  platted  coils, 
an  unconsciously  faultless  poise  of  head,  and,  equally 
unconscious,  a  dreamy  softness  of  sweeping  lashes.  As 
she  laughed  with  the  General  her  student  noted  further 
what  seemed  to  him  a  rare  silkiness  in  the  tresses,  a 
vapory  lightness  in  the  short  strands  that  played  over 

10 


Anna 


The  General's  Choice 

the  outlines  of  temple  and  forehead,  and  the  unstudied 
daintiness  with  which  they  gathered  into  the  merest 
mist  of  a  short  curl  before  her  exquisite  ear. 

But  when  now  she  spoke  with  him  these  charms 
became  forgettable  as  he  discovered,  or  fancied  he  did, 
in  her  self -oblivious  eyes,  a  depth  of  thought  and  feeling 
not  in  the  orbs  alone  but  also  in  the  brows  and  lids,  and 
between  upper  and  under  lashes  as  he  glimpsed  them 
in  profile  while  she  turned  to  Mandeville.  And  now, 
unless  his  own  insight  misled  him,  he  observed  how  un 
like  those  eyes,  and  yet  how  subtly  mated  with  them, 
was  her  mouth;  the  delicate  rising  curve  of  the  upper 
lip,  and  the  floral  tenderness  with  which  it  so  faintly 
overhung  the  nether,  wherefrom  it  seemed  ever  about 
to  part  yet  parted  only  when  she  spoke  or  smiled. 

"A  child's  mouth  and  a  woman's  eyes,"  he  mused. 

When  her  smiles  came  the  mouth  remained  as  young 
as  before,  yet  suddenly,  as  truly  as  the  eyes,  showed — 
showed  him  at  least — steadfastness  of  purpose,  while 
the  eyes,  where  fully  half  the  smile  was,  still  unwit 
tingly  revealed  their  depths  of  truth. 

"Poor  Fred!"  he  pondered  as  the  General  and  Man 
deville  entered  the  carriage  and  it  turned  away. 

A  mile  or  two  from  Carrollton  down  the  river  and 
toward  the  city  lay  the  old  unfenced  fields  where  Hilary 
had  agreed  with  Irby  to  help  him  manoeuvre  his  very 
new  command.  Along  the  inland  edge  of  this  plain 
the  railway  and  the  common  road  still  ran  side  by  side, 
but  the  river  veered  a  mile  off.  So  Mandeville  pointed 
out  to  the  two  ladies  as  they,  he,  and  the  General  drove 
up  to  the  spot  with  Kincaid  and  Greenleaf  as  outriders. 
The  chosen  ground  was  a  level  stretch  of  wild  turf 

ii 


KincaicTs  Battery 

maybe  a  thousand  yards  in  breadth,  sparsely  dotted 
with  shoulder-high  acacias.  No  military  body  was  yet 
here,  and  the  carriage  halted  at  the  first  good  view 
point. 

Mrs.  Callender,  the  only  member  of  her  family  who 
was  of  Northern  birth  and  rearing,  was  a  small  slim 
woman  whose  smile  came  whenever  she  spoke  and 
whose  dainty  nose  went  all  to  merry  wrinkles  whenever 
she  smiled.  It  did  so  now,  in  the  shelter  of  her  diminu 
tive  sunshade  opened  flat  against  its  jointed  handle  to 
fend  off  the  strong  afternoon  beams,  while  she  explained 
to  Greenleaf — dismounted  beside  the  wheels  with  Man- 
deville — that  Constance,  Anna's  elder  sister,  would 
arrive  by  and  by  with  Flora  Valcour.  "  Connie,"  she 
said,  had  been  left  behind  in  the  clutches  of  the  dress 
maker! 

"Flora,"  she  continued,  crinkling  her  nose  ever  so 
kind-heartedly  at  Greenleaf,  "is  Lieutenant  Mande- 
ville's  cousin,  you  know.  Didn't  he  tell  you  something 
back  yonder  in  Carrollton  ?  " 

Greenleaf  smiled  an  admission  and  her  happy  eyes 
closed  to  mere  chinks.  What  had  been  told  was  that 
Constance  had  yesterday  accepted  Mandeville. 

"Yes,"  jovially  put  in  the  lucky  man,  "I  have  di 
vulge'  him  that,  and  he  seem'  almoze  as  glad  as  the 
young  lady  herseff!" 

Even  to  this  the  sweet  widow's  misplaced  wrinkles 
faintly  replied,  while  Greenleaf  asked,  "Does  the 
Lieutenant's  good  fortune  account  for  the  — '  clutches 
of  the  dressmaker'  ?" 

It  did.  The  Lieutenant  hourly  expecting  to  be  ordered 
to  the  front,  this  wedding,  like  so  many  others,  would 

12 


The  General's  Choice 

be  at  the  earliest  day  possible.  "A  great  concession," 
the  lady  said,  turning  her  piquant  wrinkles  this  time 
upon  Mandeville.  But  just  here  the  General  en 
grossed  attention.  His  voice  had  warmed  sentimentally 
and  his  kindled  eye  was  passing  back  and  forth  between 
Anna  seated  by  him  and  Hilary  close  at  hand  in  the 
saddle.  He  waved  wide: 

"This  all-pervading  haze  and  perfume,  dew  and 
dream,"  he  was  saying,  "is  what  makes  this  the  Lalla 
Rookh's  land  it  is!"  He  smiled  at  himself  and  con 
fessed  that  Carrollton  Gardens  always  went  to  his  head. 
"Anna,  did  you  ever  hear  your  mother  sing — 

"' There's  a  bower  of  roses—'?" 

She  lighted  up  to  say  yes,  but  the  light  was  all  he 
needed  to  be  lured  on  through  a  whole  stanza,  and  a 
tender  sight — Ocean  silvering  to  brown-haired  Cyn 
thia — were  the  two,  as  he  so  innocently  strove  to  re 
create  out  of  his  own  lost  youth,  for  her  and  his  nephew, 
this  atmosphere  of  poetry. 

"'To  sit  in  the  roses  and  hear  the  bird's  song!'" 

he  suavely  ended — "I  used  to  make  Hilary  sing  that 
for  me  when  he  was  a  boy." 

"Doesn't  he  sing  it  yet?"  asked  Mrs.  Callender. 

"  My  God,  madame,  since  I  found  him  addicted  to 
comic  songs  I've  never  asked  him!" 

Kincaid  led  the  laugh  and  the  talk  became  lively. 
Anna  was  merrily  accused  by  Miranda  (Mrs.  Callender) 
of  sharing  the  General's  abhorrence  of  facetious  song. 
First  she  pleaded  guilty  and  then  reversed  her  plea  with 
an  absurd  tangle  of  laughing  provisos  delightful  even 

13 


Kincaid's  Battery 

to  herself.  At  the  same  time  the  General  withdrew 
from  his  nephew  all  imputation  of  a  frivolous  mind, 
though  the  nephew  avowed  himself  nonsensical  from 
birth  and  destined  to  die  so.  It  was  a  merry  moment, 
so  merry  that  Kincaid's  bare  mention  of  Mandeville  as 
Mandy  made  even  the  General  smile  and  every  one 
else  laugh.  The  Creole,  to  whom  any  mention  of  him 
self,  (whether  it  called  for  gratitude  or  for  pistols  and 
coffee,)  was  always  welcome,  laughed  longest.  If  he 
was  Mandy,  he  hurried  to  rejoin,  the  absent  Constance 
"muz  be  Candy — ha,  ha,  ha!"  And  when  Anna  said 
Miranda  should  always  thenceforth  be  Randy,  and  Mrs. 
Callender  said  Anna  ought  to  be  Andy,  and  the  very 
General  was  seduced  into  suggesting  that  then  Hilary 
would  be  Handy,  and  when  every  one  read  in  every 
one's  eye,  the  old  man's  included,  that  Brodnax  would 
naturally  be  Brandy,  the  Creole  bent  and  wept  with 
mirth,  counting  all  that  fine  wit  exclusively  his. 

"But,  no!"  he  suddenly  said,  "Hilary  he  would  be 
Dandy,  bic-ause  he's  call'  the  ladies'  man!" 

"  No,  sir ! "  cried  the  General.  "  Hil—  "  He  turned 
upon  his  nephew,  but  finding  him  engaged  with  Anna, 
faced  round  to  his  chum:  "For  Heaven's  sake,  Green- 
leaf,  does  he  allow ?" 

"He  can't  help  it  now,"  laughed  his  friend,  "he's 
tagged  it  on  himself  by  one  of  his  songs." 

"  Oh,  by  Jove,  Hilary,  it  serves  you  right  for  singing 
them!" 

Hilary  laughed  to  the  skies,  the  rest  echoing. 

"A  ladies'  man!"  the  uncle  scoffed  on.  "Of  all 
things  on  God's  earth!"  But  there  he  broke  into 
lordiy  mirth:  "Don't  you  believe  that  of  him,  ladies, 

14 


The  General's  Choice 

at  any  rate.  If  only  for  my  sake,  Anna,  don't  you  ever 
believe  a  breath  of  it!" 

The  ladies  laughed  again,  but  now  Kincaid  found 
them  a  distraction.  Following  his  glance  cityward  they 
espied  a  broad  dust-cloud  floating  off  toward  the  river. 
He  turned  to  Anna  and  softly  cried,  "Here  come  your 
guns,  trying  to  beat  the  train!" 

The  ladies  stood  up  to  see.  An  unseen  locomotive 
whistled  for  a  brief  stop.  The  dust-cloud  drew  nearer. 
The  engine  whistled  to  start  again,  and  they  could  hear 
its  bell  and  quickening  puff.  But  the  dust-cloud  came 
on  and  on,  and  all  at  once  the  whole  six-gun  battery — 
six  horses  to  each  piece  and  six  to  each  caisson — cap 
tain,  buglers,  guidon,  lieutenants,  sergeants  and  drivers 
in  the  saddle,  cannoneers  on  the  chests — swept  at  full 
trot,  thumping,  swaying,  and  rebounding,  up  the  high 
way  and  off  it,  and,  forming  sections,  swung  out  upon 
the  field  in  double  column,  while  the  roaring  train 
rolled  by  it  and  slowed  up  to  the  little  frame  box  of 
Buerthe's  Station  with  passengers  cheering  from  every 
window. 

The  Callenders'  carriage  horses  were  greatly  taxed  in 
their  nerves,  yet  they  kept  their  discretion.  Kept  it 
even  when  now  the  battery  flashed  from  column  into 
line  and  bore  down  upon  them,  the  train  meanwhile 
whooping  on  toward  Carrollton.  And  what  an  elated 
flock  of  brightly  dressed  citizens  and  citizenesses  had 
alighted  from  the  cars — many  of  them  on  the  moment's 
impulse — to  see  these  dear  lads,  with  their  romantically 
acquired  battery,  train  for  the  holiday  task  of  scaring 
the  dastard  foe  back  to  their  frozen  homes!  How  we 
loved  the  moment's  impulse  those  days! 

15 


Kincaid's  Battery 

What  a  gay  show !  And  among  the  very  prettiest  and 
most  fetchingly  arrayed  newcomers  you  would  quickly 
have  noticed  three  with  whom  this  carriage  group  ex 
changed  signals.  Kincaid  spurred  off  to  meet  them 
while  Greenleaf  and  Mandeville  helped  Anna  and 
Miranda  to  the  ground.  "There's  Constance,"  said 
the  General. 

"Yes,"  Mrs.  Callender  replied,  "and  Flora  and 
Charlie  Valcour!"  as  if  that  were  the  gleefulest  good 
luck  of  all. 

IV 

MANOEUVRES. 

CAPTAIN  IRBY,  strong,  shapely,  well  clad,  auburn- 
haired,  left  his  halted  command  and  came  into  the  car 
riage  group,  while  from  the  train  approached  his  cousin 
and  the  lithe  and  picturesque  Miss  Valcour. 

The  tallish  girl  always  looked  her  best  beside  some 
manly  form  of  unusual  stature,  and  because  that  form 
now  was  Hilary's  Irby  was  aggrieved.  All  their  days 
his  cousin  had  been  getting  into  his  light,  and  this 
realization  still  shaded  his  brow  as  Kincaid  yielded 
Flora  to  him  and  returned  to  Anna  to  talk  of  things  too 
light  for  record. 

Not  so  light  were  the  thoughts  Anna  kept  unuttered. 
Here  again,  she  reflected,  was  he  who  (according  to 
Greenleaf)  had  declined  to  command  her  guns  in  order 
to  let  Irby  have  them.  Why  ?  In  kindness  to  his  cousin, 
or  in  mild  dislike  of  a  woman's  battery  ?  If  intuition  was 
worth  while,  this  man  was  soon  to  be  a  captain  some 
where.  Here  was  that  rare  find  for  which  even  maid- 

16 


Manoeuvres 

ens'  eyes  were  alert  those  days — a  born  leader.  No 
ladies'  man  this — "of  all  things  on  God's  earth!"  A 
men's  man!  And  yet — nay,  therefore — a  man  for  some 
unparagoned  woman  some  day  to  yield  her  heart  and 
life  to,  and  to  have  for  her  very  own,  herself  his  con 
summate  adornment.  She  cast  a  glance  at  Flora. 

But  her  next  was  to  him  as  they  talked  on.  How 
nearly  black  was  the  waving  abundance  of  his  hair. 
How  placid  his  brow,  above  eyes  whose  long  lashes 
would  have  made  them  meltingly  tender  had  they  not 
been  so  large  with  mirth:  "A  boy's  eyes,"  thought  she 
while  he  remembered  what  he  had  just  called  hers.  She 
noted  his  mouth,  how  gently  firm:  "A  man's  mouth!" 

Charlie  Valcour  broke  in  between  them:  "Is  there 
not  going  to  be  any  drill,  after  all?" 

"Tell  Captain  Irby  you  can't  wait  any  longer,"  re 
plied  Kincaid  with  a  mock  frown  and  gave  Anna  yet 
gayer  attention  a  minute  more.  Then  he  walked  be 
side  his  cousin  toward  the  command,  his  horse  close  at 
his  back.  The  group,  by  pairs,  chose  view  points. 
Only  Miss  Valcour  stayed  in  the  carriage  with  the  Gen 
eral,  bent  on  effecting  a  change  in  his  mind.  In  Mobile 
Flora  had  been  easily  first  in  any  social  set  to  which  she 
condescended.  In  New  Orleans,  brought  into  the 
Calenders'  circles  by  her  cousin  Mandeville,  she  had 
found  herself  quietly  ranked  second  to  Anna,  and  Anna 
now  yet  more  pointedly  outshining  her  through  the 
brazen  splendor  of  this  patriotic  gift  of  guns.  For  this 
reason  and  others  yet  to  appear  she  had  planned  a 
strategy  and  begun  a  campaign,  one  of  whose  earliest 
manoeuvres  must  be  to  get  Irby,  not  Kincaid,  made 
their  uncle's  adjutant-general,  and  therefore  to  persuade 

17 


Kincaid's  Battery 

the  uncle  that  to  give  Kincaid  the  battery  would  endear 
him  to  Anna  and  so  crown  with  victory  the  old  man's 
perfectly  obvious  plan. 

Greenleaf  left  his  horse  tied  and  walked  apart  with 
Anna.  This,  he  murmured,  was  the  last  time  they 
would  be  together  for  years. 

"Yes,"  she  replied  with  a  disheartening  composure, 
although  from  under  the  parasol  with  which  he  shaded 
her  she  met  his  eyes  so  kindly  that  his  heart  beat 
quicker.  But  before  he  could  speak  on  she  looked 
away  to  his  fretting  horse  and  then  across  to  the  battery, 
where  a  growing  laugh  was  running  through  the  whole 
undisciplined  command.  "What  is  it  about?"  she 
playfully  inquired,  but  then  saw.  In  response  to  the 
neigh  of  Greenleaf's  steed  Hilary's  had  paused  an  in 
stant  and  turned  his  head,  but  now  followed  on  again, 
while  the  laughter  ended  in  the  clapping  of  a  hundred 
hands;  for  Kincaid's  horse  had  the  bridle  free  on  his 
neck  and  was  following  his  master  as  a  dog  follows. 
Irby  scowled,  the  General  set  his  jaws,  and  Hilary  took 
his  horse's  bridle  and  led  him  on. 

" That's  what  /  want  to  do  every  time  I  look  at  him! " 
called  Charlie  to  his  sister. 

"Then  look  the  other  way!"  carolled  back  the  slender 
beauty.  To  whom  Anna  smiled  across  in  her  belated 
way,  and  wondered  if  the  impulse  to  follow  Hilary 
Kincaid  ever  came  to  women. 

But  now  out  yonder  the  two  cousins  were  in  the 
saddle,  Irby's  sabre  was  out,  and  soon  the  manoeuvres 
were  fully  under  way.  Flora,  at  the  General's  side, 
missed  nothing  of  them,  yet  her  nimble  eye  kept  her 
well  aware  that  across  here  in  this  open  seclusion  the 

18 


Manceuvres 

desperate  Greenleaf's  words  to  Anna  were  rarely  ex 
planatory  of  the  drill. 

"And  now,"  proclaimed  Mandeville,  "you'll  see 
them  form  into  line  fazed  to  the  rear!"  And  Flora, 
seeing  and  applauding,  saw  also  Anna  turn  to  her 
suitor  a  glance,  half  pity  for  him,  half  pleading  for  his 
pity. 

"I  say  unless — "  Greenleaf  persisted 

"There  is  no  'unless.'     There  can't  ever  be  any." 

"But  may  I  not  at  least  say ?" 

"I'd  so  much  rather  you  would  not,"  she  begged. 

"At  present,  you  mean?" 

"Or  in  the  future,"  said  Anna,  and,  having  done 
perfectly  thus  far,  spoiled  all  by  declaring  she  would 
"never  marry!"  Her  gaze  rested  far  across  the  field 
on  the  quietly  clad  figure  of  Kincaid  riding  to  and  fro 
and  pointing  hither  and  yon  to  his  gold-laced  cousin. 
Off  here  on  the  left  she  heard  Mandeville  announcing: 

"Now  they'll  form  batt'rie  to  the  front  by  throwing 
caisson'  to  the  rear — look — look!  .  .  .  Ah,  ha!  was 
not  that  a  prettie?" 

Pretty  it  was  declared  to  be  on  all  sides.  Flora 
called  it  "a  beautiful."  Part  of  her  charm  was  a 
Creole  accent  much  too  dainty  for  print.  Anna  and 
Greenleaf  and  the  other  couples  regathered  about  the 
carriage,  and  Miss  Valcour  from  her  high  seat  smiled 
her  enthusiasm  down  among  them,  exalting  theirs. 
And  now  as  a  new  movement  of  the  battery  followed, 
and  now  another,  her  glow  heightened,  and  she  called 
musically  to  Constance,  Mrs.  Callender  and  Anna,  by 
turns,  to  behold  and  admire.  For  one  telling  moment 
she  was,  and  felt  herself,  the  focus  of  her  group,  the 

19 


Kincaid's  Battery 

centre  of  its  living  picture.  Out  afield  yet  another 
manoeuvre  was  on,  and  while  Anna  and  her  suitor 
stood  close  below  her  helplessly  becalmed  each  by  each, 
Flora  rose  to  her  feet  and  caught  a  great  breath  of  de 
light.  Her  gaze  was  on  the  glittering  mass  of  men, 
horses,  and  brazen  guns  that  came  thundering  across 
the  plain  in  double  column — Irby  at  its  head,  Kincaid 
alone  on  the  flank — and  sweeping  right  and  left  de 
ployed  into  battery  to  the  front  with  cannoneers  spring 
ing  to  their  posts  for  action. 

"Pretties'  of  all!"  she  cried,  and  stood,  a  gentle  air 
stirring  her  light  draperies,  until  the  boys  at  the  empty 
guns  were  red-browed  and  short  of  breath  in  their 
fierce  pretence  of  loading  and  firing.  Suddenly  the 
guns  were  limbered  up  and  went  bounding  over  the 
field,  caissons  in  front.  And  now  pieces  passed  their 
caissons,  and  now  they  were  in  line,  then  in  double 
column,  and  presently  were  gleaming  in  battery  again, 
faced  to  the  rear.  And  now  at  command  the  tired 
lads  dropped  to  the  ground  to  rest,  or  sauntered  from 
one  lounging  squad  to  another,  to  chat  and  chaff  and 
puff  cigarettes.  Kincaid  and  Irby  lent  their  horses  to 
Mandeville  and  Charlie,  who  rode  to  the  battery  while 
the  lenders  joined  the  ladies. 

Once  more  Hilary  yielded  Flora  and  sought  Anna; 
but  with  kinder  thought  for  Flora  Anna  pressed  herself 
upon  Irby,  to  the  open  chagrin  of  his  uncle.  So  Kin 
caid  cheerfully  paired  with  Flora.  But  thus  both  he 
and  Anna  unwittingly  put  the  finishing  touch  upon 
that  change  of  heart  in  the  General  which  Flora,  by 
every  subtlety  of  indirection,  this  hour  and  more  in  the 
carriage,  had  been  bringing  about. 

20 


Hilary ?-Yes,  Uncle? 

A  query:  With  Kincaid  and  Irby  the  chief  figures  in 
their  social  arena  and  Hilary  so  palpably  his  cousin's 
better  in  looks,  in  bearing,  talents,  and  character,  is  it 
not  strange  that  Flora,  having  conquest  for  her  ruling 
passion,  should  strive  so  to  relate  Anna  to  Hilary  as  to 
give  her,  Anna,  every  advantage  for  the  higher  prize  ? 
Maybe  it  is,  but  she  liked  strangeness — and  a  stiff 
game. 


HILARY? — YES,    UNCLE? 

SECOND  half  as  well  as  first,  the  drill  was  ended. 
The  low  acacias  and  great  live-oaks  were  casting  their 
longest  shadows.  The  great  plain  rested  from  the 
trample  and  whirl  of  hoofs,  guns,  and  simulated  battle. 
A  whiff  of  dust  showed  where  the  battery  ambled  town- 
ward  among  roadside  gardens,  the  Callender  carriage 
spinning  by  it  to  hurry  its  three  ladies  and  Mandeville 
far  away  to  the  city's  lower  end.  At  the  column's  head 
rode  Irby  in  good  spirits,  having  got  large  solace  of 
Flora's  society  since  we  last  saw  her  paired  with  Kin 
caid.  Now  beside  the  tiny  railway  station  Hilary  was 
with  her  once  more  as  she  and  Charlie  awaited  the  train 
from  town.  Out  afield  were  left  only  General  Brodnax 
and  Greenleaf,  dismounted  between  the  Northerner's 
horse  and  Hilary's.  Now  Kincaid  came  across  the  turf. 

"Greenleaf,"  said  the  old  soldier,  "why  does  Hilary 
forever  walk  as  though  he  were  bringing  the  best  joke 
of  the  season?  Can't  you  make  him  quit  it?" 

The  nephew  joined  them:  "  Uncle,  if  you'd  like  to 
borrow  my  horse  I  can  go  by  train." 

21 


KincaicTs  Battery 

That  was  a  joke.  "H-m-m!  I  see!  No,  Greenleaf  s 
going  by  train.  Would  you  like  to  ride  with  me  ?  " 

"Well,  eh — ha!  Why,  uncle,  I — why,  of  course,  if 
Fred  really — "  They  mounted  and  went. 

"Hilary?" 

"Yes,  uncle?" 

"How  is  it  now?    Like  my  girl  any  better?" 

"Why— yes!     Oh,  she's  fine!    And  yet  I " 

"You  must  say?    What  must  you  say?" 

"Nothing  much;  only  that  she's  not  the  kind  to 
seem  like  the  owner  of  a  field  battery.  My  goodness! 
uncle,  if  she  had  half  Miss  Flora's  tang " 

"She  hasn't  the  least  need  of  it!  She's  the  quiet 
kind,  sir,  that  fools  who  love  'tang'  overlook!" 

"Yes,"  laughed  Hilary,  "she's  quiet;  quiet  as  a 
fortification  by  moonlight!  Poor  Fred!  I  wish " 

"Well,  thank  God  you  wish  in  vain!  That's  just 
been  settled.  I  asked  him — oh,  don't  look  surprised 
at  me.  Good  Lord !  hadn't  I  the  right  to  know  ?  " 

The  two  rode  some  way  in  silence.  "  I  wish,"  mused 
the  nephew  aloud,  "it  could  be  as  he  wants  it." 

The  uncle's  smile  was  satirical:  "Did  you  ever,  my 
boy,  wish  anything  could  be  as  7  want  it  ?  " 

"Now,  uncle,  there's  a  big  difference " 

"DAMN  THE  DIFFERENCE!  I'm  going  to  try  you. 
I'm  going  to  make  Adolphe  my  adjutant-general. 
Then  if  you  hanker  for  this  battery  as  it  hankers  for 
you " 

" Mary,  Queen  of  Scots!"  rejoiced  Hilary.  "That'll 
suit  us  both  to  the  bone!  And  if  it  suits  you  too " 

"Well  it  doesn't!  You  know  I've  never  wanted 
Adolphe  about  me.  But  you've  got  me  all  snarled  up, 

22 


Hilary ?-Yes,  Uncle? 

the  whole  kit  of  you.  What's  more,  I  don't  want  him 
for  my  heir  nor  any  girl  with  'tang'  for  mistress  of  my 
lands  and  people.  Hilary,  I  swear!  if  you've  got  the 
sand  to  want  Anna  and  she's  got  the  grace  to  take  you, 
then,  adjutant-general  or  not,  I'll  leave  you  my  whole 
fortune!  Well,  what  amuses  you  now?" 

"Why,  uncle,  all  the  cotton  in  New  Orleans  couldn't 
tempt  me  to  marry  the  girl  I  wouldn't  take  dry  so  with 
out  a  continental  cent." 

"But  your  own  present  poverty  might  hold  you  back 
even  from  the  girl  you  wanted,  mightn't  it?" 

"No!"  laughed  the  nephew,  "nothing  would!" 

"  Good  God!  Well,  if  you'll  want  Anna  I'll  make  it 
easy  for  you  to  ask  for  her.  If  not,  I'll  make  it  as  hard 
as  I  can  for  you  to  get  any  one  else." 

Still  Hilary  laughed:  "H-oh,  uncle,  if  I  loved  any 
girl,  I'd  rather  have  her  without  your  estate  than  with 
it."  Suddenly  he  sobered  and  glowed:  "I  wish  you'd 
leave  it  to  Adolphe!  He's  a  heap-sight  better  business 
man  than  I.  Besides,  being  older,  he  feels  he  has  the 
better  right  to  it.  You  know  you  always  counted  on 
leaving  it  to  him." 

The  General  looked  black:  "You  actually  decline 
the  gift?" 

"No.  No,  I  don't.  I  want  to  please  you.  But  of 
my  own  free  choice  I  wouldn't  have  it.  I'm  no  abo 
litionist,  but  I  don't  want  that  kind  of  property.  I 
don't  want  the  life  that  has  to  go  with  it.  I  know  other 
sorts  that  are  so  much  better.  I'm  not  thinking  only 
of  the  moral  responsibility " 

"By !  sir,  I  am!" 

"I  know  you  are,  and  I  honor  you  for  it." 

23 


Kincaid's  Battery 

"Bah!  .  .  .  Hilary,  I — I'm  much  obliged  to  you  for 
your  company,  but " 

"You've  had  enough,"  laughed  the  good-natured 
young  man.  "  Good -evening,  sir."  He  took  a  cross- 
street. 

"Good-evening,  my  boy."  The  tone  was  so  kind 
that  Hilary  cast  a  look  back.  But  the  General's  eyes 
were  straight  before  him. 

Greenleaf  accompanied  the  Valcours  to  their  door. 
Charlie,  who  disliked  him,  and  whose  admiration  for 
his  own  sister  was  privately  cynical,  had  left  them  to 
themselves  in  the  train.  There,  wholly  undetected  by 
the  very  man  who  had  said  some  women  were  too 
feminine  and  she  was  one,  she  had  played  her  sex 
against  his  with  an  energy  veiled  only  by  its  intellectual 
nimbleness  and  its  utterly  dispassionate  design.  Char 
lie  detected  achievement  in  her  voice  as  she  twittered 
good-by  to  the  departing  soldier  from  their  street  door. 

VI 

MESSRS.    SMELLEMOUT    AND    KETCHEM 

NIGHT  came,  all  stars.  The  old  St.  Charles  Theatre 
filled  to  overflowing  with  the  city's  best,  the  hours 
melted  away  while  Maggie  Mitchell  played  Fanchon, 
and  now,  in  the  bright  gas-light  of  the  narrow  thorough 
fare,  here  were  Adolphe  and  Hilary  helping  their  three 
ladies  into  a  carriage.  All  about  them  the  feasted 
audience  was  pouring  forth  into  the  mild  February  night. 

The  smallest  of  the  three  women  was  aged.  That 
24 


Messrs.  Smellemout  and  Ketchem 

the  other  two  were  young  and  beautiful  we  know 
already.  At  eighteen  the  old  lady,  the  Bohemian-glass 
one,  had  been  one  of  those  royalist  refugees  of  the 
French  Revolution  whose  butterfly  endeavors  to  colo 
nize  in  Alabama  and  become  bees  make  so  pathetic  a 
chapter  in  history.  When  one  knew  that,  he  could 
hardly  resent  her  being  heavily  enamelled.  Irby 
pressed  into  the  coach  after  the  three  and  shut  the 
door,  Kincaid  uncovered,  and  the  carriage  sped  off. 

Hilary  turned,  glanced  easily  over  the  heads  of  the 
throng,  and  espied  Greenleaf  beckoning  with  a  slender 
cane.  Together  they  crossed  the  way  and  entered  the 
office  of  a  public  stable. 

"Our  nags  again,"  said  Kincaid  to  one  of  a  seated 
group,  and  passed  into  a  room  beyond.  Thence  he  re 
issued  with  his  dress  modified  for  the  saddle,  and  the 
two  friends  awaited  their  mounts  under  an  arch. 
"Dost  perceive,  Frederic,"  said  the  facetious  Hilary, 
"yon  modestly  arrayed  pair  of  palpable  gents  hieing 
hitherward  -yet  pretending  not  to  descry  us  ?  They  be 
detectives.  Oh — eh — gentlemen ! " 

The  strangers  halted  inquiringly  and  then  came  for 
ward.  The  hair  of  one  was  black,  of  the  other  gray. 
Hilary  brightened  upon  them:  "I  was  just  telling  my 
friend  who  you  are.  You  know  me,  don't  you?"  A 
challenging  glint  came  into  his  eye. 

But  the  gray  man  showed  a  twinkle  to  match  it: 
"Why — by  sight — yes — what  there  is  of  you." 

Hilary  smiled  again:  "I  saw  you  this  morning  in 
the  office  of  the  Committee  of  Public  Safety,  where  I 
was  giving  my  word  that  this  friend  of  mine  should 
leave  the  city  within  twenty-four  hours."  He  intro- 

25 


Kincaid's  Battery 

duced  him:  "Lieutenant  Greenleaf,  gentleman,  United 
States  Army.  Fred,  these  are  Messrs.  Smellemout  and 
Ketchem,  a  leading  firm  in  the  bottling  business." 

Greenleaf  and  the  firm  expressed  their  pleasure. 
"We  hang  out  at  the  corner  of  Poet  and  Good-Children 
Streets,"  said  the  black-haired  man,  but  made  his  eyes 
big  to  imply  that  this  was  romance. 

Greenleaf  lifted  his  brows:  "Streets  named  for  your 
selves,  I  judge." 

"Aye.     Poet  for  each,  Good-Children  for  both." 

Kincaid  laughed  out.  "The  Lieutenant  and  I,"  he 
said  as  he  moved  toward  their  approaching  horses, 
"live  on  Love  street  exactly  half-way  between  Piety  and 
Desire."  His  eyes  widened,  too.  Suddenly  he  stepped 
between  Greenleaf  and  the  others:  "See  here,  let's 
begin  to  tell  the  truth!  You  know  Kincaid's  Foundry? 
It  was  my  father's " 

"  And  his  father's  before  him,"  said  the  gray  man. 

"And  I've  come  home  to  go  into  this  war,"  Hilary 
went  on. 

"And  just  at  present,"  said  Gray,  "you're  casting 
shot  and  shell  and  now  and  then  a  cannon;  good  for 
you!  You  want  to  give  us  your  guarantee ?" 

"That  my  friend  and  I  will  be  together  every  moment 
till  he  leaves  to-morrow  morning  on  the  Jackson  Rail 
road,  bound  for  the  North  without  a  stop." 

"To  go  into  this  war  on  the  other  side!" 

"Why,  of  course!"  said  the  smiling  Kincaid.  "Now, 
that's  all,  isn't  it?  I  fear  we're  keeping  you." 

"Oh,  no."  The  gray  man's  crow's-feet  deepened 
playfully.  "If  you  think  you  need  us  we'll  stick  by  you 
all  night." 

26 


By  Starlight 

"No,"  laughed  Kincaid,  "there's  no  call  for  you  to 
be  so  sticky  as  all  that."  The  horsemen  mounted. 

"Better  us  than  the  Patriots'  League,"  said  the 
younger  detective  to  Hilary  as  Greenleaf  moved  off. 
"They've  got  your  friend  down  in  their  Send-'em-to- 
hell  book  and  are  after  him  now.  That's  how  come 
we  to  be " 

"  I  perceive,"  replied  Hilary,  and  smiled  in  meditation. 
"Why— thank  you,  both!" 

"  Oh,  you  go  right  along,  Mr.  Kincaid.  We'll  be  at 
the  depot  to-morrow  ourselves,  and  to-night  we'll  see 
that  they  don't  touch  neither  one  of  you." 

Hilary's  smile  grew :  "  Why — thank  you  again !  That 
will  make  it  more  comfortable  for  them.  Good-night." 

The  two  friends  rode  to  a  corner,  turned  into  Poydras 
Street,  crossed  Magazine  and  Tchoupitoulas  and 
presently,  out  from  among  the  echoing  fronts  of  un- 
lighted  warehouses,  issued  upon  the  wide,  white  Levee. 

VII 

BY    STARLIGHT 

"WAIT,"  murmured  Greenleaf,  as  they  halted  to 
view  the  scene.  From  their  far  right  came  the  vast, 
brimming  river,  turbid,  swift,  silent,  its  billows  every 
now  and  then  rising  and  looking  back  as  if  they  fled 
from  implacable  pursuers;  sweeping  by  long,  slumber 
ing  ranks  of  ships  and  steamboats;  swinging  in  majestic 
breadth  around  the  bend  a  mile  or  more  below;  and  at 
the  city's  end,  still  beyond,  gliding  into  mystic  oblivion. 
Overhead  swarmed  the  stars  and  across  the  flood  came 

27 


Kincaid's  Battery 

faintly  the  breath  of  orange-groves,  sea-marshes  and 
prairies. 

Greenleaf  faced  across  the  wide  bend  at  his  left.  In 
that  quarter,  quite  hidden  in  live-oaks  and  magnolias, 
as  both  well  knew,  were  the  low,  red  towers  of  Jackson 
Barracks.  But  it  was  not  for  them  the  evicted  young 
soldier  claimed  this  last  gaze.  It  was  for  a  large 
dwelling  hard  by  them,  a  fine  old  plantation  house  with 
wide  verandas,  though  it  also  was  shut  from  view,  in 
its  ancient  grove. 

"Fred,"  said  Hilary,  "didn't  she  tell  you  why?" 

"No,"  replied  the  lover  when  they  had  turned  away 
and  were  moving  up  the  harbor  front,  "except  that  it 
is  n't  because  I'm  for  the  Union." 

Hilary's  eyes  went  wide:  "That's  wonderful,  old 
man!  But  I  don't  believe  she  likes  a  soldier  of  any 
sort.  If  I  were  a  woman  I'd  be  doggoned  if  I'd  ever 
marry  a  soldier!" 

"Yet  the  man  who  gets  her,"  said  Greenleaf,  "ought 
to  be  a  soldier  in  every  drop  of  his  blood.  You  don't 
know  her  yet;  but  you  soon  will,  and  I'm  glad." 

"Now,  why  so?  I  can't  ever  please  her  enough  to 
be  pleased  with  her.  I'm  too  confounded  frivolous !  I 
love  nonsense,  doggon  it,  for  its  own  sake!  I  love  to 
get  out  under  a  sky  like  this  and  just  reel  and  whoop 
in  the  pure  joy  of  standing  on  a  world  that's  whirling 
round!" 

"But  you  do  please  her.     She's  told  me  so." 

"Don't  you  believe  her!  I  don't.  I  can't.  I  tell 
you,  Fred,  I  could  never  trust  a  girl  that  forever  looks 
so  trustworthy!  S'pose  I  should  fall  in  love  with  her! 
Would  you — begrudge  her  to  me?" 

28 


By  Starlight 

"I  bequeath  her  to  you." 

"Ah!  you  know  I  haven't  the  ghost  of  a  chance! 
She's  not  for  po'  little  Hil'ry.  I  never  did  like  small 
women,  anyhow!" 

"My  boy!  If  ever  you  like  this  one  she'll  no  more 
seem  small  than  the  open  sea." 

"I  suppose,"  mused  Hilary,  "that's  what  makes  it 
all  the  harder  to  let  go.  If  a  girl  has  a  soul  so  petty 
that  she  can  sit  and  hear  you  through  to  the  last  word 
your  heart  can  bleed,  you  can  turn  away  from  her  with 
some  comfort  of  resentment,  as  if  you  still  had  a  rem 
nant  of  your  own  stature." 

"Precisely!"  said  the  lover.  "But  when  she's  too 
large-hearted  to  let  you  speak,  and  yet  answers  your  un 
spoken  word,  once  for  all,  with  a  compassion  so  modest 
that  it  seems  as  if  it  were  you  having  compassion  on 
her,  she's  harder  to  give  up  than " 

"Doggon  her,  Fred,  I  wouldn't  give  her  up!" 

"Ah,  this  war,  Hilary!  I  may  never  see  her  again. 
There's  just  one  man  in  this  world  whom " 

"Oh,  get  out!" 

"I  mean  what  I  say.    To  you  I  leave  her." 

"Ha,  ha!  No,  you  don't!  It's  only  to  her  you 
leave  me.  Old  boy,  promise  me!  If  you  ever  come 
back  and  she's  still  in  the  ring,  you'll  go  for  her  again 
no  matter  who  else  is  bidding,  your  humble  servant  not 
excepted." 

"Why — yes — I — I  promise  that.  Now,  will  you 
promise  me?" 

"What!  let  myself ?" 

"Yes." 

"  Ho-o,  not  by  a  jug-full !  If  ever  I  feel  her  harpoon 
29 


Kincaid's  Battery 

in  me  I'll  fight  like  a  whale!  But  I  promise  you  this, 
and  warn  you,  too:  That  when  it  comes  to  that,  a 
whole  platoon  of  Fred  Greenleafs  between  her  and  me 
won't  make  a  pinch  of  difference." 

To  that  Greenleaf  agreed,  and  the  subject  was 
changed.  With  shipping  ever  on  their  left  and  cotton- 
yards  and  warehouses  for  tobacco  and  for  salt  on  their 
right  their  horses'  feet  clinked  leisurely  over  the  cobble 
pavements,  between  thousands  of  cotton-bales  headed 
upon  the  unsheltered  wharves  and  only  fewer  thou 
sands  on  the  narrow  sidewalks. 

So  passed  the  better  part  of  an  hour  before  they  were 
made  aware,  by  unmistakable  odors,  that  they  were 
nearing  the  Stock-Landing.  There,  while  they  were  yet 
just  a  trifle  too  far  away  to  catch  its  echoes,  had  occurred 
an  incident — a  fracas,  in  fact — some  of  whose  results 
belong  with  this  narrative  to  its  end.  While  they  amble 
toward  the  spot  let  us  reconnoitre  it.  Happily  it  has 
long  been  wiped  out,  this  blot  on  the  city's  scutcheon. 
Its  half-dozen  streets  were  unspeakable  mud,  its  air  was 
stenches,  its  buildings  were  incredibly  foul  slaughter 
houses  and  shedded  pens  of  swine,  sheep,  beeves,  cows, 
calves,  and  mustang  ponies.  The  plank  footways  were 
enclosed  by  stout  rails  to  guard  against  the  chargings  of 
long-horned  cattle  chased  through  the  thoroughfares  by 
lasso-whirling  "bull-drivers"  as  wild  as  they.  In  the 
middle  of  the  river-front  was  a  ferry,  whence  Louis 
iana  Avenue,  broad,  treeless,  grassy,  and  thinly  lined 
with  slaughter-houses,  led  across  the  plain.  Down  this 
untidy  plaisance  a  grimy  little  street-car,  every  half -hour, 
jogged  out  to  the  Carrollton  railway  and  returned. 
This  street  and  the  water-front  were  lighted — twilighted 

3° 


By  Starlight 

— with  lard-oil  lamps;  the  rest  of  the  place  was  dark. 
At  each  of  the  two  corners  facing  the  ferry  was  a 
"coffee-house" — dram-shop,  that  is  to  say. 

Messrs.  Sam  Gibbs  and  Maxime  Lafontaine  were 
president  and  vice-president  of  that  Patriots'  League 
against  whose  machinations  our  two  young  men  had 
been  warned  by  the  detectives  in  St.  Charles  Street. 
They  had  just  now  arrived  at  the  Stock-Landing. 
Naturally,  on  so  important  an  occasion  they  were  far 
from  sober;  yet  on  reaching  the  spot  they  had  lost  no 
time  in  levying  on  a  Gascon  butcher  for  a  bucket  of  tar 
and  a  pillow  of  feathers,  on  an  Italian  luggerman  for  a 
hurried  supper  of  raw  oysters,  and  on  the  keeper  of  one 
of  the  "coffee-houses"  for  drinks  for  the  four. 

"Us  four  and  no  more!"  sang  the  gleeful  Gibbs; 
right  number  to  manage  a  delicate  case.  The  four  glasses 
emptied,  he  had  explained  that  all  charges  must  be 
collected,  of  course,  from  the  alien  gentleman  for  whom 
the  plumage  and  fixative  were  destined.  Hence  a  loud 
war  of  words,  which  the  barkeeper  had  almost  smoothed 
out  when  the  light-hearted  Gibbs  suddenly  decreed 
that  the  four  should  sing,  march,  pat  and  "cut  the 
pigeon-wing  "  to  the  new  song  (given  nightly  by  Christy's 
Minstrels)  entitled  "Dixie's  Land." 

Hot  threats  recurring,  Gascony  had  turned  to  go, 
Maxime  had  headed  him  off,  Italy's  hand  had  started 
into  his  flannel  shirt,  and  "bing!  bang!  pop!"  rang 
Gibbs's  repeater  and  one  of  Maxime' s  little  derringers — 
shot  off  from  inside  his  sack-coat  pocket.  A  whirlwind 
of  epithets  filled  the  place.  Out  into  the  stinking  dark 
leaped  Naples  and  Gascony,  and  after  them  darted 
their  whooping  assailants.  The  shutters  of  both  bar- 
Si 


Kincaid's  Battery 

rooms  clapped  to,  over  the  way  a  pair  of  bull-drivers 
rushed  to  their  mustangs,  there  was  a  patter  of  hoofs 
there  and  of  boots  here  and  all  inner  lights  vanished. 
A  watchman's  rattle  buzzed  remotely.  Then  silence 
reigned. 

Now  Sam  and  Maxime,  deeming  the  incident  closed, 
were  walking  up  the  levee  road  beyond  the  stock-pens, 
in  the  new  and  more  sympathetic  company  of  the  two 
mounted  bull-drivers,  to  whose  love  of  patriotic  adven 
ture  they  had  appealed  successfully.  A  few  yards 
beyond  a  roadside  pool  backed  by  willow  bushes  they 
set  down  tar-bucket  and  pillow,  and  under  a  low,  vast 
live-oak  bough  turned  and  waited.  A  gibbous  moon 
had  set,  and  presently  a  fog  rolled  down  the  river, 
blotting  out  landscape  and  stars  and  making  even 
these  willows  dim  and  unreal.  Ideal  conditions !  Now 
if  their  guest  of  honor,  with  or  without  his  friend, 
would  but  stop  at  this  pool  to  wash  the  Stock-Landing 
muck  from  his  horse's  shins — but  even  luck  has  its 
limits. 

Nevertheless,  that  is  what  occurred.  A  hum  of 
voices — a  tread  of  hoofs — and  the  very  man  hoped  for 
— he  and  Hilary  Kincaid — recognized  by  their  voices — 
dismounted  at  the  pool's  margin.  Sam  and  Maxime 
stole  forward. 


One  Killed 

VIII 

ONE   KILLED 

THE  newcomers'  talk,  as  they  crouched  busily  over 
their  horses'  feet,  was  on  random  themes:  Dan  Rice, 
John  Owens,  Adelina  and  Carlotta  Patti,  the  compara 
tive  merits  of  Victor's  and  Moreau's  restaur' — hah! 
Greenleaf  snatched  up  his  light  cane,  sprang  erect,  and 
gazed  close  into  the  mild  eyes  of  Maxime.  Gibbs's 
more  wanton  regard  had  no  such  encounter;  Hilary 
gave  him  a  mere  upward  glance  while  his  hands  con 
tinued  their  task. 

''Good-evening,"  remarked  Gibbs. 

"Good-morning,"  chirped  Hilary,  and  scrubbed  on. 
"  Do  you  happen  to  be  Mr.  Samuel  Gibbs  ? — Don't  stop, 
Fred,  Maxime  won't  object  to  your  working  on." 

"Yes,  he  will!"  swore  Gibbs,  "and  so  will  I!" 

Still  Hilary  scrubbed:  "Why  so,  Mr.  Gibbs?" 

"Bic-ause,"  put  in  Maxime,  "he's  got  to  go  back 
through  the  same  mud  he  came!" 

"Why,  then,"  laughed  Hilary,  "I  may  as  well  knock 
off,  too,"  and  began  to  wash  his  hands. 

"No,"  growled  Gibbs,  "you'll  ride  on;  we're  not 
here  for  you." 

"You  can't  have  either  of  us  without  the  other,  Mr. 
Gibbs,"  playfully  remarked  Kincaid.  The  bull-drivers 
loomed  out  of  the  fog.  Hilary  leisurely  rose  and  moved 
to  draw  a  handkerchief. 

"None  o'  that!"  cried  Gibbs,  whipping  his  repeater 
into  Kincaid's  face.  Yet  the  handkerchief  came  forth, 
its  owner  smiling  playfully  and  drying  his  fingers  while 

33 


KincaicTs  Battery 

Mr.  Gibbs  went  on  blasphemously  to  declare  himself 
"no  chicken." 

"Oh,  no,"  laughed  Hilary,  "none  of  us  is  quite  that. 
But  did  you  ever  really  study — boxing?"  At  the  last 
word  Gibbs  reeled  under  a  blow  in  the  face;  his  re 
volver,  going  off  harmlessly,  was  snatched  from  him, 
Maxime's  derringer  missed  also,  and  Gibbs  swayed, 
bleeding  and  sightless,  from  Hilary's  blows  with  the 
butt  of  the  revolver.  Presently  down  he  lurched  in 
sensible,  Hilary  going  half-way  with  him  but  recovering 
and  turning  to  the  aid  of  his  friend.  Maxime  tore  loose 
from  his  opponent,  beseeching  the  bull-drivers  to  at 
tack,  but  beseeching  in  vain.  Squawking  and  chatter 
ing  like  parrot  and  monkey,  they  spurred  forward, 
whirled  back,  gathered  lassos,  cursed  frantically  as 
Sam  fell,  sped  off  into  the  fog,  spurred  back  again,  and 
now  reined  their  ponies  to  their  haunches,  while  Kin- 
caid  halted  Maxime  with  Gibbs's  revolver,  and  Green- 
leaf  sprang  to  the  bits  of  his  own  and  Hilary's  terrified 
horses.  For  two  other  men,  the  Gascon  and  the 
Italian,  had  glided  into  the  scene  from  the  willows,  and 
the  Gascon  was  showing  Greenleaf  two  big  knives,  one 
of  which  he  fiercely  begged  him  to  accept. 

"Take  it,  Fred!"  cried  Hilary  while  he  advanced  on 
the  defiantly  retreating  Maxime;  but  as  he  spoke  a 
new  cry  of  the  drovers  turned  his  glance  another  way. 
Gibbs  had  risen  to  his  knees  unaware  that  the  Italian, 
with  yet  another  knife,  was  close  behind  him.  At  a 
bound  Hilary  arrested  the  lifted  blade  and  hurled  its 
wielder  aside,  who  in  the  next  breath  seemed  to  spring 
past  him  head  first,  fell  prone  across  the  prostrate 
Gibbs,  turned  face  upward,  and  slid  on  and  away 

34 


One  Killed 

— lassoed.     Both    bull-drivers    clattered    off    up    the 
road. 

"Hang  to  the  nags,  Fred!"  cried  Hilary,  and  let 
Maxime  leap  to  Gibbs's  side,  but  seized  the  Gascon  as 
with  murderous  intent  he  sprang  after  him.  It  took 
Kincaid's  strength  to  hold  him,  and  Gibbs  and  his 
partner  would  have  edged  away,  but — "Stand!"  called 
Hilary,  and  they  stood,  Gibbs  weak  and  dazed,  yet  still 
spouting  curses.  The  Gascon  begged  in  vain  to  be  al 
lowed  to  follow  the  bull-drivers. 

"Stay  here!"  said  Hilary  in  French,  and  the  butcher 
tarried.  Hilary  passed  the  revolver  to  his  friend, 
mounted  and  dashed  up  the  highway. 

The  Gascon  stayed  with  a  lively  purpose  which  the 
enfeebled  Gibbs  was  the  first  to  see.  "  Stand  back,  you. 
hell-hound!"  cried  the  latter,  and  with  fresh  oaths  bade 
Greenleaf  "keep  him  off!" 

Maxime  put  Gibbs  on  Greenleaf 's  horse  (as  bidden), 
and  was  about  to  lead  him,  when  Kincaid  galloped 
back. 

"Fred,"  exclaimed  Hilary,  "they've  killed  the  poor 
chap."  He  wheeled.  "Come,  all  hands,"  he  con 
tinued,  and  to  Greenleaf  added  as  they  went,  "He's 
lying  up  here  in  the  road  with " 

Greenleaf  picked  up  something.  "Humph!"  said 
Hilary,  receiving  it,  "knives  by  the  great  gross.  He 
must  have  used  this  trying  to  cut  the  lasso;  the  one 
he  had  back  yonder  flew  into  the  pond."  He  reined 
in:  "Here's  where  they — Why,  Fred — why,  I'll  swear! 
They've  come  back  and — Stop!  there  was  a  skiff" — 
he  moved  to  the  levee  and  peered  over — "It's  gone!" 

The  case  was  plain,  and  while  from  Greenleaf's 

35 


Kincaid's  Battery 

saddle  Gibbs  broke  into  frantic  revilings  of  the  fugitives 
for  deserting  him  and  Maxime  to  sink  their  dead  in  the 
mid-current  of  the  fog-bound  river,  Kincaid  and  his 
friend  held  soft  counsel.  Evidently  the  drovers  had 
turned  their  horses  loose,  knowing  they  would  go  to 
their  stable.  No  despatch  to  stop  Greenleaf  could  be 
sent  by  anyone  up  the  railroad  till  the  Committee  of 
Public  Safety  had  authorized  it,  so  Hilary  would  drop 
them  a  line  out  of  his  pocket  note-book,  and  by  day 
break  these  prisoners  could  go  free. 

"Mr.  Gibbs"— he  said  as  he  wrote— " I  have  the 
sprout  of  a  notion  that  you  and  Mr.  Lafontaine  would 
be  an  ornament  to  a  field-battery  I'm  about  to  take 
command  of.  I'd  like  to  talk  with  you  about  that 
presently."  He  tore  out  the  page  he  had  written  and 
beckoned  the  Gascon  aside: 

"Mon  ami" — he  showed  a  roll  of  "city  money"  and 
continued  in  French — "do  you  want  to  make  a  hun 
dred  dollars — fifty  now  and  fifty  when  you  bring  me  an 
answer  to  this?" 

The  man  nodded  and  took  the  missive. 

The  old  "Jackson  Railroad"  avoided  Carrollton  and 
touched  the  river  for  a  moment  only,  a  short  way 
beyond,  at  a  small  bunch  of  flimsy  clapboard  houses 
called  Kennerville.  Here  was  the  first  stop  of  its  early 
morning  outbound  train,  and  here  a  dozen  or  so  pas 
sengers  always  poked  their  heads  out  of  the  windows. 
This  morning  they  saw  an  oldish  black  man  step  off, 
doff  his  hat  delightedly  to  two  young  men  waiting  at 
the  platform's  edge,  pass  them  a  ticket,  and  move 
across  to  a  pair  of  saddled  horses.  The  smaller  of  the 

36 


Her  Harpoon  Strikes 

pair  stepped  upon  the  last  coach,  but  kept  his  com 
panion's  hand  till  the  train  had  again  started. 

"Good-by,  Tony,"  cried  the  one  left  behind. 

"  Good-by,  Jake,"  called  the  other,  and  waved.  His 
friend  watched  the  train  vanish  into  the  forest.  Then, 
as  his  horse  was  brought,  he  mounted  and  moved  back 
toward  the  city. 

Presently  the  negro,  on  the  other  horse,  came  up 
almost  abreast  of  him.  "  Mahs'  Hil'ry  ?  "  he  ventured. 

"Well,  uncle  Jerry?" 

"Dat's  a  pow'ful  good-lookin'  suit  oj  clo'es  what 
L'tenant  Greenfeel  got  awn." 

"Jerry!  you  cut  me  to  the  heart!" 

The  negro  tittered:  "Oh,  as  to  dat,  I  don't  'spute 
but  yone  is  betteh." 

The  master  heaved  a  comforted  sigh.  The  ser 
vant  tittered  again,  but  suddenly  again  was  grave.  "  I 
on'y  wish  to  Gawd,"  he  slowly  said,  "dat  de  next  time 
you  an'  him  meet " 

"Well— next  time  we  meet— what  then?" 

"Dat  you  bofe  be  in  de  same  sawt  o'  clo'es  like  you 
got  on  now." 

IX 

HER   HARPOON   STRIKES 

THE  home  of  the  Callenders  was  an  old  Creole  colo 
nial  plantation-house,  large,  square,  strong,  of  two 
stories  over  a  stoutly  piered  basement,  and  surrounded 
by  two  broad  verandas,  one  at  each  story,  beneath  a 
great  hip  roof  gracefully  upheld  on  Doric  columns.  It 
bore  that  air  of  uncostly  refinement  which  is  one  of  the 

37 


Kincaid's  Battery 

most  pleasing  outward  features  of  the  aloof  civilization 
to  which  it,  though  not  the  Callenders,  belonged. 

Inside,  its  aspect  was  exceptional.  There  the  inornate 
beauty  of  its  finish,  the  quiet  abundance  of  its  delicate 
woodwork,  and  the  high  spaciousness  and  continuity  of 
its  rooms  for  entertainment  won  admiration  and  fame. 
A  worthy  setting,  it  was  called,  for  the  gentle  manners 
with  which  the  Callenders  made  it  alluring. 

They,  of  course,  had  not  built  it.  The  late  Judge 
had  acquired  it  from  the  descendants  of  a  planter  of 
indigo  and  coffee  who  in  the  oldest  Creole  days  had 
here  made  his  home  and  lived  his  life  as  thoroughly  in 
the  ancient  baronial  spirit  as  if  the  Mississippi  had  been 
the  mediaeval  Rhine.  Only  its  perfect  repair  was  the 
Judge's  touch,  a  touch  so  modestly  true  as  to  give  it  a 
charm  of  age  and  story  which  the  youth  and  beauty  of 
the  Callender  ladies  only  enhanced,  enhancing  it  the 
more  through  their  lack  of  a  male  protector — because 
of  which  they  were  always  going  to  move  into  town,  but 
never  moved. 

Here,  some  nine  or  ten  days  after  Greenleaf's  flight, 
Hilary  Kincaid,  in  uniform  at  last,  was  one  of  two 
evening  visitors,  the  other  being  Mandeville.  In  the 
meantime  our  lover  of  nonsense  had  received  a  "hard 
jolt."  So  he  admitted  in  a  letter  to  his  friend, 
boasting,  however,  that  it  was  unattended  by  any 
"internal  injury."  In  the  circuit  of  a  single  week, 
happening  to  be  thrown  daily  and  busily  into  "her" 
society,  "the  harpoon  had  struck." 

He  chose  the  phrase  as  an  honest  yet  delicate  re 
minder  of  the  compact  made  when  last  the  two  chums 
had  ridden  together. 

38 


Her  Harpoon  Strikes 

All  three  of  the  Callenders  were  in  the  evening  group, 
and  the  five  talked  about  an  illumination  of  the  city, 
set  for  the  following  night.  In  the  business  centre  the 
front  of  every  building  was  already  being  hung  with 
fittings  from  sidewalk  to  cornice.  So  was  to  be  cele 
brated  the  glorious  fact  (Constance  and  Mandeville's 
adjective)  that  in  the  previous  month  Louisiana  had 
seized  all  the  forts  and  lighthouses  in  her  borders  and 
withdrawn  from  the  federal  union  by  a  solemn  ordi 
nance  signed  in  tears.  This  great  lighting  up,  said 
Hilary,  was  to  be  the  smile  of  fortitude  after  the  tears. 
Over  the  city  hall  now  floated  daily  the  new  flag  of  the 
state,  with  the  colors  of  its  stripes 

"Reverted  to  those  of  old  Spain,"  murmured  Anna, 
mainly  to  herself  yet  somewhat  to  Hilary.  Judge  Cal- 
lender  had  died  a  Whig,  and  politics  interested  the 
merest  girls  those  days. 

Even  at  the  piano,  where  Anna  played  and  Hilary 
hovered,  in  pauses  between  this  of  Mozart  and  that  of 
Mendelssohn,  there  was  much  for  her  to  ask  and  him 
to  tell  about;  for  instance,  the  new  "Confederate 
States,"  a  bare  fortnight  old!  Would  Virginia  come 
into  them?  Eventually,  yes. 

"Oh,  yes,  yes,  yes!"  cried  Constance,  overhearing. 
(Whatever  did  not  begin  with  oh,  those  times,  began 
with  ah.) 

"  And  must  war  follow  ?  "  The  question  was  Anna's 
again,  and  Hilary  sat  down  closer  to  answer  con 
fidentially: 

"Yes,  the  war  was  already  a  fact." 

"And  might  not  the  Abolitionists  send  their  ships 
and  soldiers  against  New  Orleans?" 

39 


Kincaid's  Battery 

"Yes,  the  case  was  supposable." 

"And  might  not  Jackson's  battlefield  of  1815,  in 
close  view  from  these  windows,  become  a  new  one  ?  " 

To  avoid  confessing  that  old  battlefields  have  that 
tendency  the  Captain  rose  and  took  up  a  guitar;  but 
when  he  would  have  laid  it  on  her  knee  she  pushed  it 
away  and  asked  the  song  of  him;  asked  with  something 
intimate  in  her  smiling  undertone  that  thrilled  him, 
yet  on  the  next  instant  seemed  pure  dream  stuff.  The 
others  broke  in  and  Constance  begged  a  song  of  the  new 
patriotism;  but  Miranda,  the  pretty  stepmother,  spoke 
rather  for  something  a  thousand  miles  and  months 
away  from  the  troubles  and  heroics  of  the  hour;  and 
when  Anna  seconded  this  motion  by  one  fugitive  glance 
worth  all  their  beseechings  Hilary,  as  he  stood,  gayly 
threw  open  his  smart  jacket  lest  his  brass  buttons  mar 
the  instrument,  and  sang  with  a  sudden  fervor  that 
startled  and  delighted  all  the  group: 

"Drink  to  me  only  with  thine  eyes." 

In  the  midst  of  which  Constance  lifted  a  knowing 
look  across  to  Miranda,  and  Miranda  sent  it  back. 

There  was  never  an  evening  that  did  not  have  to  end, 
and  at  last  the  gentlemen  began  to  make  a  show  of 
leaving.  But  then  came  a  lively  chat,  all  standing  in 
a  bunch.  To-morrow's  procession,  the  visitors  said, 
would  form  in  Canal  Street,  move  up  St.  Charles,  return 
down  Camp  Street  into  Canal,  pass  through  it  into 
Rampart,  take  the  Bayou  Road  and  march  to  a  grand 
review  away  out  in  the  new  camp  of  instruction  at  the 
Creole  Race-Course.  Intermediately,  from  a  certain 
Canal  Street  balcony,  Flora  would  present  the  flag! 

40 


Sylvia  Sighs 

the  gorgeous  golden,  silken,  satin  battle  standard  which 
the  Callenders  and  others  had  helped  her  to  make.  So 
— good-night — good-night. 

The  last  parting  was  with  Mandeville,  at  the  levee- 
road  gate,  just  below  which  he  lived  in  what,  during 
the  indigo-planter's  life,  had  been  the  overseer's  cottage. 
At  a  fine  stride  our  artillerist  started  townward,  his 
horse  being  stabled  near  by  in  that  direction.  But 
presently  he  halted,  harkened  after  the  Creole's  reced 
ing  step,  thought  long,  softly  called  himself  names,  and 
then  did  a  small  thing  which,  although  it  resulted  in 
nothing  tragic  at  the  time,  marked  a  turning  point  in 
his  life.  He  leapt  the  grove  fence,  returned  to  the 
shadows  of  the  garden,  and  silently  made  his  way  to 
its  eastern,  down-river  side.  Already  the  dwelling's 
lower  lights  were  going  out  while  none  yet  shone  above, 
and  he  paused  in  deep  shade  far  enough  away  to  see, 
over  its  upper  veranda's  edge,  the  tops  of  its  chamber 
windows. 

X 

SYLVIA   SIGHS 

THE  house  was  of  brick.  So  being,  in  a  land  where 
most  dwellings  are  of  wood,  it  had  gathered  beauty 
from  time  and  dignity  from  tried  strength,  and  with 
satisfying  grace  joined  itself  to  its  grounds,  whose 
abundance  and  variety  of  flowering,  broad-leaved  ever 
greens  lent,  in  turn,  a  poetic  authenticity  to  its  Greek 
columns  and  to  the  Roman  arches  of  its  doors  and  win 
dows.  Especially  in  these  mild,  fragrant,  blue  nights 
was  this  charm  potent,  and  the  fair  home  seemed  to  its 


KincaicTs  Battery 

hidden  beholder  forever  set  apart  from  the  discords  and 
distresses  of  a  turbulent  world.  And  now  an  upper 
window  brightened,  its  sash  went  up,  and  at  the 
veranda's  balustrade  Anna  stood  outlined  against  the 
inner  glow. 

She  may  have  intended  but  one  look  at  the  stars, 
but  they  and  the  spiced  air  were  enchanting,  and  in 
confidence  that  no  earthly  eye  was  on  her  she  tarried, 
gazing  out  to  the  farthest  gleam  of  the  river  where  it 
swung  southward  round  the  English  Turn. 

Down  in  the  garden  a  mirthful  ecstasy  ran  through 
all  the  blood  of  her  culprit  observer  and  he  drank  to 
her  only  with  his  eyes.  Against  the  window's  bright 
ness  her  dark  outline  showed  true,  and  every  smallest 
strand  of  her  hair  that  played  along  the  contours  of 
brow  and  head  changed  his  merriment  to  reverence 
and  bade  his  heart  recognize  how  infinitely  distant  from 
his  was  her  thought.  Hilary  Kincaid !  can  you  read  no 
better  than  that? 

Her  thought  was  of  him.  Her  mind's  eye  saw  him 
on  his  homeward  ride.  It  marked  the  erectness  of  his 
frame,  the  gayety  of  his  mien,  the  dance  of  his  locks. 
By  her  inner  ear  she  heard  his  horse's  tread  passing  up 
the  narrow  round-stone  pavements  of  the  Creole 
Quarter,  presently  to  echo  in  old  St.  Peter  Street  under 
the  windows  of  Pontalba  Row — one  of  which  was 
Flora's.  Would  it  ring  straight  on,  or  would  it  pause 
between  that  window  and  the  orange  and  myrtle 
shades  of  Jackson  Square?  Constance  had  said  that 
day  to  Miranda — for  this  star-gazer  to  overhear — that 
she  did  not  believe  Kincaid  loved  Flora,  and  the  hearer 
had  longed  to  ask  her  why,  but  knew  she  could  not  tell. 

42 


Sylvia  Sighs 

Why  is  a  man's  word.  "They're  as  helpless  without 
it,"  the  muser  recalled  having  very  lately  written  on  a 
secret  page,  "as  women  are  before  it.  And  yet  a  girl 
can  be  very  hungry,  at  times,  for  a  why.  They  say 
he's  as  brave  as  a  lion — why  is  he  never  brave  to 
me?" 

So  futilely  ended  the  strain  on  the  remembered  page, 
but  while  his  unsuspected  gaze  abode  on  her  lifted  eyes 
her  thought  prolonged  the  note:  "If  he  meant  love  to 
night,  why  did  he  not  stand  to  his  meaning  when  I 
laughed  it  away  ?  Was  that  for  his  friend's  sake,  or  is 
he  only  not  brave  enough  to  make  one  wild  guess 
at  me?  Ah,  I  bless  Heaven  he's  the  kind  that  cannot! 
And  still — oh,  Hilary  Kincaid,  if  you  were  the  girl  and 
I  the  man!  I  shouldn't  be  on  my  way  home;  I'd  be 
down  in  this  garden — "  She  slowly  withdrew. 

Hilary,  stepping  back  to  keep  her  in  sight,  was  sud 
denly  aware  of  the  family  coachman  close  at  his  side. 
Together  they  moved  warily  a  few  steps  farther. 

"You  mus'  escuse  me,  Cap'n,"  the  negro  amiably 
whispered.  "You  all  right,  o'  co'se!  Yit  dese  days, 
wid  no  white  gen'leman  apputtainin'  onto  de  place " 

"Old  man!"  panted  Hilary,  "you've  saved  my  life!" 

"Oh,  my  Lawd,  no!    Cap'n,  I " 

"Yes,  you  have!  I  was  just  going  into  fits!  Now 
step  in  and  fetch  me  out  here — "  He  shaped  his  arms 
fantastically  and  twiddled  his  fingers. 

Bending  with  noiseless  laughter  the  negro  nodded  and 
went. 

Just  within  her  window,  Anna,  still  in  reverie,  sat 
down  at  a  slender  desk,  unlocked  a  drawer,  then, a 
second  one  inside  it,  and  drew  forth — no  mere  secret 

43 


Kincaid's  Battery 

page  but — a  whole  diary!  "To  Anna,  from  Miranda, 
Christmas,  1860."  Slowly  she  took  up  a  pen,  as 
gradually  laid  it  by  again,  and  opposite  various  dates 
let  her  eyes  rest  on — not  this,  though  it  was  still 
true: 

"The  more  we  see  of  Flora,  the  more  we  like  her." 

Nor  this:  "Heard  a  great,  but  awful,  sermon  on  the 
duty  of  resisting  Northern  oppression." 

But  this:  "Connie  thinks  he  'inclines'  to  me.  Ho! 
all  he's  ever  said  has  been  for  his  far-away  friend.  I 
wish  he  would  incline,  or  else  go  ten  times  as  far  away ! 
Only  not  to  the  war — God  forbid!  Ah,  me,  how  I 
long  for  his  inclining!  And  while  I  long  he  laughs, 
and  the  more  he  laughs  the  more  I  long,  for  I  never, 
never  so  doted  on  any  one's  laugh.  Oh,  shame !  to  love 
before " 

What  sound  was  that  below?  No  mocking-bird 
note,  no  south  wind  in  the  foliage,  but  the  kiss  of  fingers 
on  strings!  Warily  it  stole  in  at  the  window,  while 
softly  as  an  acacia  the  diary  closed  its  leaves.  The  bent 
head  stirred  not,  but  a  thrill  answered  through  the 
hearer's  frame  as  a  second  cadence  ventured  up  and  in 
and  a  voice  followed  it  in  song.  Tremblingly  the  book 
slid  into  the  drawer,  inner  and  outer  lock  clicked  whis- 
peringly,  and  gliding  to  a  door  she  harkened  for  any  step 
of  the  household,  while  she  drank  the  strains,  her 
bosom  heaving  with  equal  alarm  and  rapture. 

If  any  song  is  good  which  serves  a  lover's  ends  we 
need  claim  no  more  for  the  one  that  rose  to  Anna  on  the 
odors  of  the  garden  and  drove  her  about  the  room, 
darting,  clinging,  fluttering,  returning,  like  her  own 
terrified  bird  above  her  in  its  cage. 

44 


Sylvia  Sighs 

When  Sylvia  sighs 
And  veils  the  worshipped  wonder 

Of  her  blue  eyes 
Their  sacred  curtains  under, 

Naught  can  so  nigh  please  me  as  my  tender  anguish. 
Only  grief  can  ease  me  while  those  lashes  languish. 

Woe  best  beguiles; 
Mirth,  wait  thou  other  whiles; 
Thou  shalt  borrow  all  my  sorrow 
When  Sylvia  smiles. 

But  what  a  strange  effect !  Could  this  be  that  Anna 
Callender  who  "  would  no  more  ever  again  seem  small 
than  the  ocean?"  Is  this  that  maiden  of  the  " belated, 
gradual  smile"  whom  the  singer  himself  so  lately  named 
"a  profound  pause?"  Your  eyes,  fair  girl,  could 
hardly  be  more  dilated  if  they  saw  riot,  fire,  or  ship 
wreck.  Nor  now  could  your  brow  show  more  exalta 
tion  responsive  to  angels  singing  in  the  sun;  nor  now 
your  frame  show  more  affright  though  soldiers  were 
breaking  in  your  door.  Anna,  Anna!  your  fingers  are 
clenched  in  your  palms,  and  in  your  heart  one  frenzy 
implores  the  singer  to  forbear,  while  another  bids  him 
sing  on  though  the  heavens  fall.  Anna  Callender!  do 
you  not  know  this?  You  have  dropped  into  a  chair, 
you  grip  the  corners  of  your  desk.  Now  you  are  up 
again,  trembling  and  putting  out  your  lights.  And  now 
you  seek  to  relight  them,  but  cannot  remember  the  place 
or  direction  of  anything,  and  when  you  have  found  out 
what  you  were  looking  for,  do  not  know  how  much 
time  has  flown,  except  that  the  song  is  still  in  its  first 
stanza.  Are  you  aware  that  your  groping  hand  has 
seized  and  rumpled  into  its  palm  a  long  strand  of 
slender  ribbon  lately  unwound  from  your  throat  ? 

45 


Kincaid's  Battery 

A  coy  tap  sounds  on  her  door  and  she  glides  to  it. 
"Who — who?"  But  in  spite  of  her  it  opens  to  the 
bearer  of  a  lamp,  her  sister  Constance. 

"Who— who—  ?"  she  mocks  in  soft  glee.  "That's 
the  question!  'Who  is  Sylvia?'" 

"Don't  try  to  come  in!  I — I — the  floor  is  all  strewn 
with  matches!" 

The  sister's  mirth  vanishes:  "Why,  Nan!  what  is 
the  matter?" 

"Do-on't  whisper  so  loud!    He's  right  out  there!" 

"But,  dearie!  it's  nothing  but  a  serenade." 

"It's  an  outrage,  Con!  How  did  he  ever  know — 
how  did  he  dare  to  know — this  was  my  window  ?  Oh, 
put  out  that  lamp  or  he'll  think  I  lighted  it — No!  no! 
don't  put  it  out,  he'll  think  I  did  that,  too!" 

"Why,  Nan!  you  never  in  your  life " 

"Now,  Connie,  that  isn't  fair!  I  won't  stay  with 
you ! "  The  speaker  fled.  Constance  put  out  the  light. 

A  few  steps  down  and  across  a  hall  a  soft  sound 
broke,  and  Anna  stood  in  Miranda's  doorway  wearing 
her  most  self-contained  smile:  "Dearie!"  she  quietly 
said,  "isn't  it  too  ridiculous!" 

Miranda  crinkled  a  smile  so  rife  with  love  and  in 
sight  that  Anna's  eyes  suddenly  ran  full  and  she  glided 
to  her  knees  by  the  seated  one  and  into  her  arms,  mur 
muring,  "You  ought  both  of  you  to  be  ashamed  of 
yourselves!  You're  totally  mistaken!" 

Presently,  back  in  the  dusk  of  her  own  room,  an 
audible  breathing  betrayed  her  return,  and  Constance 
endeavoured  to  slip  out,  but  Anna  clung:  "You  sha'n't 
go!  You  sha' — "  Yet  the  fugitive  easily  got  away. 

Down  among  the  roses  a  stanza  had  just  ended. 


In  Column  of  Platoons 

Anna  tiptoed  out  half  across  the  dim  veranda,  tossed 
her  crumpled  ribbon  over  the  rail,  flitted  back,  bent 
an  ear,  and  knew  by  a  brief  hush  of  the  strings  that 
the  token  had  drifted  home. 

The  die  was  cast.  From  brow  and  heart  fled  all 
perturbation  and  once  more  into  her  eyes  came  their 
wonted  serenity — with  a  tinge  of  exultation — while  the 
strings  sounded  again,  and  again  rose  the  song: 

When  Sylvia  smiles 
Her  eyes  to  mine  inclining, 

Like  azure  isles 
In  seas  of  lovelight  shining, 
With  a  merry  madness  find  I  endless  pleasure — 
Till  she  sighs — then  sadness  is  my  only  treasure. 

Woe  best  beguiles; 
Mirth,  wait  thou  other  whiles, 
Thou  shalt  borrow  all  my  sorrow 
When  Sylvia  smiles. 

XI 

IN   COLUMN    OF    PLATOONS 

LOVE'S  war  was  declared.  From  hour  to  hour  of 
that  night  and  the  next  morning,  in  bed,  at  board, 
dressing  for  the  thronged  city,  spinning  with  Constance 
and  Miranda  up  Love  Street  across  Piety  and  Desire 
and  on  into  the  town's  centre,  Anna,  outwardly  all 
peace,  planned  that  war's  defensive  strategy.  Splen 
didly  maidenly  it  should  be,  harrowingly  arduous  to 
the  proud  invader,  and  long  drawn  out.  Constance 
should  see  what  a  man  can  be  put  through.  But  oh, 
but  oh,  if,  after  all,  the  invasion  should  not  come! 

47 


KincaicTs  Battery 

In  those  days  New  Orleans  paved  her  favorite 
streets,  when  she  paved  them  at  all,  with  big  blocks  of 
granite  two  feet  by  one.  They  came  from  the  North  as 
ballast  in  those  innumerable  wide-armed  ships  whose 
cloud  of  masts  and  cordage  inspiringly  darkened  the 
sky  of  that  far-winding  river-front  where  we  lately  saw 
Hilary  Kincaid  and  Fred  Greenleaf  ride.  Beginning 
at  the  great  steamboat  landing,  half  a  mile  of  Canal 
Street  had  such  a  pavement  on  either  side  of  its  broad 
grassy  "neutral  ground."  So  had  the  main  streets 
that  led  from  it  at  right  angles.  Long  afterward,  even 
as  late  as  when  the  Nineteenth  Century  died,  some  of 
those  streets  were  at  the  funeral,  clad  in  those  same  old 
pavements,  worn  as  smooth  and  ragged  as  a  gentleman- 
beggar's  coat.  St.  Charles  Street  was  one.  Another 
was  the  old  Rue  Royale,  its  squat  ground-floor  domiciles 
drooping  their  mossy  eaves  half  across  the  pinched 
sidewalks  and  confusedly  trying  to  alternate  and  align 
themselves  with  tall  brick  houses  and  shops  whose 
ample  two-  and  three-story  balconies  were  upheld, 
balustraded,  and  overhung  by  slender  garlandries  of 
iron  openwork  as  graceful  and  feminine  as  a  lace  man 
tilla.  With  here  and  there  the  flag  of  a  foreign  consul 
hanging  out  and  down,  such  is  the  attire  the  old  street 
was  vain  of  in  that  golden  time  when  a  large  square  sign 
on  every  telegraph  pole  bade  you  get  your  shirts  at 
S.  N.  Moody's,  corner  of  Canal  and  Royal  Streets. 

At  this  corner,  on  the  day  after  the  serenade,  there 
was  a  dense,  waiting  crowd.  On  the  other  corner  of 
Royal,  where  the  show-windows  of  Hyde  &  Goodrich 
blazed  with  diamonds,  and  their  loftily  nested  gold 
pelican  forever  fed  her  young  from  her  bleeding  breast, 

48 


In  Column  of  Platoons 

stood  an  equal  throng.  Across  Canal  Street,  where  St. 
Charles  opens  narrowly  southward,  were  similar  masses, 
and  midway  between  the  four  corners  the  rising  circles  of 
stone  steps  about  the  high  bronze  figure  of  Henry  Clay 
were  hidden  by  men  and  boys  packed  as  close  as  they 
could  sit  or  stand.  A  great  procession  had  gone  up 
town  and  would  by  and  by  return.  Near  and  far  ban 
ners  and  pennons  rose  and  fell  on  the  luxurious  air,  and 
the  ranks  and  ranks  of  broad  and  narrow  balconies 
were  so  many  gardens  of  dames  and  girls,  parasols,  and 
diaphanous  gowns.  Near  the  front  of  the  lowest  Hyde 
&  Goodrich  balcony,  close  by  the  gilded  pelican,  sat 
the  Callenders,  all  gladness,  holding  mute  dialogues 
with  Flora  and  Madame  Valcour  here  on  the  balcony  of 
Moody's  corner.  It  was  the  birthday  of  Washington. 

Not  of  him,  however,  did  Flora  and  her  grandmother 
softly  converse  in  Spanish  amid  the  surrounding  babel 
of  English  and  French.  Their  theme  was  our  battery 
drill  of  some  ten  days  before,  a  subject  urged  upon 
Flora  by  the  mosquito-like  probings  of  Madame's 
musically  whined  queries.  Better  to  be  bled  of  almost 
any  information  by  the  antique  little  dame  than  to 
have  her  light  on  it  some  other  way,  as  she  had  an 
amazing  knack  of  doing.  Her  acted  part  of  things 
Flora  kept  untold;  but  grandma's  spirit  of  divination 
could  unfailingly  supply  that,  and  her  pencilled  brows, 
stiff  as  they  were,  could  tell  the  narrator  she  had  done 
so. 

Thus  now,  Flora  gave  no  hint  of  the  beautiful  skill 
and  quick  success  with  which,  on  her  homeward  rail 
way  trip  with  Greenleaf  that  evening,  she  had  bettered 
his  impressions  of  her.  By  no  more  than  a  gentle  play 

49 


Kincaid's  Battery 

of  light  and  shade  in  her  smile  and  an  undulating 
melody  of  voice — without  a  word  that  touched  the 
wound  itself,  but  with  a  timid  glow  of  compassionate 
admiration — she  had  soothed  the  torture  of  a  heart 
whose  last  hope  Anna  had  that  same  hour  put  to 
death. 

"But  before  he  took  the  train  with  you,"  murmured 
the  mosquito  to  the  butterfly,  "when  he  said  the  General 
was  going  to  take  Irby  upon  his  staff  and  give  the 
battery  to  Kincaid,  what  did  you  talk  of?" 

"Talk  of?  Charlie.  He  said  I  ought  to  make 
Charlie  join  the  battery." 

"Ah?  For  what?  To  secure  Kincaid's  protection 
of  your  dear  little  brother's  health — character — morals 
—eh?" 

"Yes,  'twas  so  lie  put  it,"  replied  Flora,  while  the 
old  lady's  eyebrows  visibly  cried : 

"You  sly  bird!  will  you  impute  all  your  own  words 
to  that  Yankee,  and  his  to  yourself?" 

Which  is  just  what  Flora  continued  to  do  as  the 
grandma  tinkled:  "And  you  said — what?" 

"I  said  if  I  couldn't  keep  him  at  home  I  ought  to 
get  him  into  the  cavalry.  You  know,  dear,  in  the  in 
fantry  the  marches  are  so  cruel,  the  camps  so " 

"But  in  the  artillery,"  piped  the  small  dame,  "they 
ride,  eh?"  (It  was  a  trap  she  was  setting,  but  in  vain 
was  the  net  spread.) 

"No,"  said  the  serene  girl,  "they,  too,  go  afoot. 
Often  they  must  help  the  horses  drag  the  guns  through 
the  mire.  Only  on  parade  they  ride,  or  when  rushing 
to  and  fro  in  battle,  whips  cracking,  horses  plunging, 
the  hills  smoking  and  shaking!"  The  rare  creature 

50 


In  Column  of  Platoons 

sparkled  frankly,  seeing  the  battery  whirling  into  action 
with  its  standard  on  the  wind — this  very  flag  she  ex 
pected  presently  to  bestow. 

"And  with  Kincaid  at  the  head!"  softly  cried  the 
antique. 

The  girl  put  on  a  fondness  which  suddenly  became  a 
withering  droop  of  the  eyes:  "Don't  mince  your  smile 
so,  grannie  dear,  I  can  hear  the  paint  crack." 

The  wee  relic  flashed,  yet  instantly  was  bland  again : 
"You  were  about  to  say,  however,  that  in  the  artil 
lery ?" 

"The  risks  are  the  deadliest  of  all." 

"Ah,  yes!"  sang  the  mosquito,  "and  for  a  sister  to 
push  her  boy  brother  into  a  battery  under  such  a  com 
mander  would  be  too  much  like  murder!" 

The  maiden  felt  the  same  start  as  when  Greenleaf 
had  ventured  almost  those  words.  "Yes,"  she  beam 
ingly  rejoined,  "that's  what  I  told  the  Lieutenant." 

"With  a  blush?" 

"No,"  carelessly  said  the  slender  beauty,  and  ex 
changed  happy  signals  with  the  Callenders. 

"You  tricksy  wretch!"  muttered  the  grandmother  to 
herself.  For  though  Charlie  was  in  the  battery  by  his 
own  choice,  Hilary  would  have  kept  him  out  had  not 
the  sister  begged  to  have  him  let  in. 

Suddenly  there  was  a  glad  stoppage  of  all  by-play  in 
the  swarming  streets.  Down  St.  Charles  from  LaFayette 
Square  came  the  shock  of  saluting  artillery,  and  up 
Royal  from  Jackson  Square  rolled  back  antiphonal 
thunders. 

"  Grandma!"  softly  cried  Flora,  as  if  sharing  the  gen 
eral  elation,  but  had  begun  again  to  tell  of  Greenleaf, 

51 


Kincaid's  Battery 

when  from  far  over  in  Camp  Street  her  subtle  ear  caught 
a  faint  stray  sigh  of  saxhorns. 

"Well?  well?  about  the  Yankee—  ?"  urged  Madame. 

" Oh,  a  trifle!  He  was  to  go  that  night,  and  thinking 
he  might  some  day  return  in  very  different  fashion  and 
we  be  glad  to  make  use  of  him,  I — "  The  speaker's 
lithe  form  straightened  and  her  gaze  went  off  to  the 
left.  "Here  they  come ! "  she  said,  and  out  where  Camp 
Street  emerges,  a  glint  of  steel,  a  gleam  of  brass,  a 
swarming  of  the  people  that  way,  and  again  a  shimmer 
of  brass  and  steel,  affirmed  her  word  that  the  long, 
plumed,  bristling  column  had  got  back  to  the  arms  of 
its  darling  Canal  Street. 

"Yes,"  cried  many,  "they're  turning  this  way!" 

"Well?— Well?"  insisted  the  old  lady  amid  the  rising 
din.  "And  so  you — you?" 

" Be  more  careful,"  murmured  the  girl.  "I  told  him 
that  our  convictions — about  this  war — yours  and  mine 
— not  Charlie's — are  the  same  as  his." 

A  charming  sight  she  was,  even  in  that  moment  of 
public  enthusiasm  and  spectacle,  holding  the  wonder 
ing  stare  of  her  companion  with  a  gayety  that  seemed 
ready  to  break  into  laughter.  The  dainty  Madame 
went  limp,  and  in  words  as  slow  and  soft  as  her  smile, 
sighed,  "You  are  a  genius!" 

"No,  only  the  last  thing  you  would  suspect — a  good 
housekeeper.  I  have  put  him  up  in  sugar." 

The  distant  martial  strains  became  more  coherent. 
In  remote  balconies  handkerchiefs  fluttered  wildly,  and 
under  nearer  and  nearer  ones  the  people  began  to  pack 
closer  and  choose  their  footing  along  the  curb.  Pres 
ently  from  the  approaching  column  came  who  but 

52 


In  Column  of  Platoons 

Hilary  Kincaid,  galloping  easily  over  the  slippery  pave 
ments.  Anna  saw  his  eyes  sweep  the  bank  of  human 
flowers  (with  its  occasional  male  caterpillar)  on  Moody 's 
balcony  and  light  upon  Flora.  He  lifted  his  kepi  and 
halted.  One  could  read  his  soft  questions. 

"All  right?  All  ready?  Where  are  the  others?— 
Ah!"  He  sent  an  eager  salutation  to  the  Callenders, 
and  two  joyfully  bowed,  but  Anna  gave  no  sign.  With 
great  dignity  her  gaze  was  bent  beyond  him  on  the 
nearing  host,  and  when  Constance  plucked  her  arm 
she  tardily  looked  three  wrong  ways. 

The  rider  could  not  wait.  The  police  were  pressing 
back  the  jubilant  masses,  swarms  of  ladies  on  the  rear 
forms  were  standing  up,  and  Flora,  still  seated,  had 
leaned  down  beamingly  and  was  using  every  resource 
of  voice  and  fan  to  send  him  some  word  through  the 
tumult  of  plaudits  and  drums.  He  spurred  close.  In 
a  favoring  hush — drum-corps  inviting  the  band — she 
bent  low  and  with  an  arch  air  of  bafflement  tried  once 
more,  but  an  outburst  of  brazen  harmonies  tore  her 
speech  to  threads.  Suddenly — 

"Ever  of  thee  I'm  fondly  dreaming — " 

pealed  the  cornets,  pumped  the  trombones,  whipping  it 
out,  cracking  it  off,  with  a  rigor  of  rhythm  to  shame 
all  peace-time  languishments — 

"Thy  gentle  voice  my  spirit  can  cheer. 
Thou  art  the  star—" 

What  could  the  balconies  do  but  wave  more  joyously 
than  ever?  The  streets  hurrahed!  The  head  of  the 
procession  was  here!  The  lone  horseman  reined  back, 
wheeled,  cast  another  vain  glance  toward  Anna,  and 

53 


Kincaid's  Battery 

with  an  alarming  rataplan  of  slipping  and  recovering 
hoofs  sped  down  the  column. 

But  what  new  rapture  was  this  ?  Some  glorious  luck 
had  altered  the  route,  and  the  whole  business  swung 
right  into  this  old  rue  Royale!  Now,  now  the  merry 
clamor  and  rush  of  the  crowd  righting  itself!  And 
behold!  this  blazing  staff  and  its  commanding  general 
— general  of  division!  He  first,  and  then  all  they, 
bowed  to  Flora  and  her  grandmother,  bowed  to  the 
Callenders,  and  were  bowed  to  in  return.  A  mounted 
escort  followed.  And  now — yea,  verily!  General 
Brodnax  and  his  staff  of  brigade!  Wave,  Valcours, 
wave  Callenders!  Irby's  bow  to  Flora  was  majestic, 
and  hers  to  him  as  gracious  as  the  smell  of  flowers  in 
the  air.  And  here  was  Mandeville,  most  glittering  in 
all  the  glitter.  Flora  beamed  on  him  as  well,  Anna 
bowed  with  a  gay  fondness,  Miranda's  dainty  nose 
crimped  itself,  and  Constance,  with  a  blitheness  even 
more  vivid,  wished  all  these  balconies  could  know  that 
Captain — he  was  Lieutenant,  but  that  was  away  back 
last  week — Captain  Etienne  Aristide  Rofignac  de  Man 
deville  was  hers,  whom,  after  their  marriage,  now  so 
near  at  hand,  she  was  going  always  to  call  Steve! 

XII 

MANDEVILLE    BLEEDS 

Two  overflowing  brigades!  In  the  van  came  red- 
capped  artillery.  Not  the  new  battery,  though  happily 
known  to  Flora  and  the  Callenders;  the  Washington 
Artillery.  Illustrious  command !  platoons  and  platoons 

54 


Mandeville  Bleeds 

of  the  flower  of  the  Crescent  City's  youth  and  worth! 
They,  too,  that  day  received  their  battle-flag.  They 
have  the  shot-torn  rags  of  it  yet. 

Ah,  the  clanging  horns  again,  and  oh,  the  thundering 
drums!  Another  uniform,  on  a  mass  of  infantry,  an 
other  band  at  its  head  braying  another  lover's  song 
reduced  to  a  military  tramp,  swing,  and  clangor — 

"I'd  offer  thee  this  hand  of  mine 
If  I  could  love  thee  less—" 

Every  soldier  seemed  to  have  become  a  swain. 
Hilary  and  Anna  had  lately  sung  this  wail  together, 
but  not  to  its  end,  she  had  called  it  "so  ungenuine." 
How  rakishly  now  it  came  ripping  out.  "  My  fortune  is 
too  hard  for  thee,"  it  declared,  "  'twould  chill  thy  dearest 
joy.  I'd  rather  weep  to  see  thee  free,"  and  ended  with 
"destroy";  but  it  had  the  swagger  of  a  bowling-alley. 

All  the  old  organizations,  some  dating  back  to  '12- 
'15,  had  lately  grown  to  amazing  numbers,  while  many 
new  ones  had  been  so  perfectly  uniformed,  armed, 
accoutred  and  drilled  six  nights  a  week  that  the  ladies, 
in  their  unmilitary  innocence,  could  not  tell  the  new 
from  the  old.  Except  in  two  cases:  Even  Anna 
was  aware  that  the  "Continentals,"  in  tasseled  top- 
boots,  were  of  earlier  times,  although  they  had  changed 
their  buff  knee-breeches  and  three-cornered  hats  for  a 
smart  uniform  of  blue  and  gray;  while  these  red-and- 
blue-flannel  Zouaves,  drawing  swarms  of  boys  as  dray- 
loads  of  sugar-hogsheads  drew  flies,  were  as  modern  as 
1 86 1  itself.  But  oh,  ah,  one  knew  so  many  young  men! 
It  was  wave,  bow,  smile  and  bow,  smile  and  wave,  till 
the  whole  frame  was  gloriously  weary. 

55 


Kincaid's  Battery 

Near  Anna  prattled  a  Creole  girl  of  sixteen  with 
whom  she  now  and  then  enjoyed  a  word  or  so :  Victor- 
ine  Lafontaine,  daughter  of  our  friend  Maxime. 

" Louisiana  Foot-Rifles — ah!  but  their  true  name," 
she  protested,  "are  the  Chasseurs-a-Pied !  'Twas  to 
them  my  papa  billong'  biffo'  he  join'  hisseff  on  the 
batt'rie  of  Captain  Kincaid,  and  there  he's  now  a  cor 
poreal!" 

What  jaunty  fellows  they  were!  and  as  their  faultless 
ranks  came  close,  their  glad,  buskined  feet  beating  as 
perfect  music  for  the  roaring  drums  as  the  drums  beat 
for  them,  Anna,  in  fond  ardor,  bent  low  over  the  rail 
and  waved,  exhorting  Miranda  and  Constance  to  wave 
with  her.  So  marched  the  chasseurs  by,  but  the  wide 
applause  persisted  as  yet  other  hosts,  with  deafening 
music  and  perfect  step  and  with  bayonets  back-slanted 
like  the  porcupine's,  came  on  and  on,  and  passed  and 
passed,  ignoring  in  grand  self-restraint  their  very  loves 
who  leaned  from  the  banquettes'  edges  and  from  bal- 
ustraded  heights  and  laughed  and  boasted  and  wor 
shipped. 

Finally  artillery  again!  every  man  in  it  loved  by 
some  one — or  dozen — in  these  glad  throngs.  Clap! 
call!  wave!  Oh,  gallant  sight!  These  do  not  enter 
Royal  Street.  They  keep  Canal,  obliquing  to  that 
side  of  the  way  farthest  from  the  balconies 

"To  make  room,"  cries  Victorine,  "to  form  line 
pritty  soon  off  horses,  in  front  those  cannon'." 

At  the  head  rides  Kincaid.  Then,  each  in  his  place, 
lieutenants,  sergeants,  drivers,  the  six-horse  teams  lean 
ing  on  the  firm  traces,  the  big  wheels  clucking,  the  long 
Napoleons  shining  like  gold,  and  the  cannoneers — oh, 

56 


Mandeville  Bleeds 

God  bless  the  lads! — planted  on  limbers  and  caissons, 
with  arms  tight  folded  and  backs  as  plumb  as  the 
meridian.  Now  three  of  the  pieces,  half  the  battery, 
have  gone  by  and 

"Well,  well,  if  there  isn't  Sam  Gibbs,  sergeant  of  a 
gun!  It  is,  I  tell  you,  it  is!  Sam  Gibbs,  made  over 
new,  as  sure  as  a  certain  monosyllable !  and  what  could 
be  surer,  for  Sam  Gibbs?" 

So  laugh  the  sidewalks;  but  society,  overhead,  cares 
not  for  a  made-over  Gibbs  while  round  about  him  are 
sixty  or  seventy  young  heroes  who  need  no  making 
over.  Anna,  Anna!  what  a  brave  and  happy  half-and- 
half  of  Creoles  and  "Americans"  do  your  moist  eyes 
beam  down  upon :  here  a  Canonge  and  there  an  Ogden 
— a  Zacherie — a  Fontennette — Willie  Geddes — Tom 
Norton — a  Fusilier!  Nat  Frellsen — a  Tramontana — a 
Grandissime! — and  a  Grandissime  again!  Percy  Chil- 
ton — a  Dudley — Arthur  Puig  y  Puig — a  De  Armas — 
MacKnight — Violett — A vendano — Rob  Rareshide — 
Guy  Palfrey — a  Morse,  a  Bien,  a  Fuentes — a  Grand- 
issme  once  more!  Aleck  Moise — Ralph  Fenner — Ned 
Ferry! — and  lo!  a  Raoul  Innerarity,  image  of  his  grand 
father's  portrait — and  a  Jules  St.  Ange!  a  Converse — 
Jack  Eustis — two  Frowenfelds!  a  Mossy!  a  Hennen — 
Bartie  Sloo — McVey,  McStea,  a  De  Lavillebuevre — a 
Thorndyke-Smith  and  a  Grandissime  again! 

And  ah!  see  yonder  young  cannoneer  half-way  be 
tween  these  two  balconies  and  the  statue  beyond ;  that 
foppish  boy  with  his  hair  in  a  hundred  curls  and  his 
eyes  wild  with  wayward  ardor!  "Ah,  Charlie  Val- 
cour!"  thinks  Anna;  "oh,  your  poor  sister!"  while  the 
eyes  of  Victorine  take  him  in  secretly  and  her  voice  is 

57 


KincaicTs  Battery 

still  for  a  whole  minute.  Hark!  From  the  head  of 
the  column  is  wafted  back  a  bugle-note,  and  every 
thing  stands. 

Now  the  trim  lads  relax,  the  balcony  dames  in  the 
rear  rows  sit  down,  there  are  nods  and  becks  and 
wafted  whispers  to  a  Calder  and  an  Avery,  to  tall  Numa 
Dolhonde  and  short  Eugene  Chopin,  to  George  Wood 
and  Dick  Penn  and  Fenner  and  Bouligny  and  Pilcher 
and  L'Hommedieu;  and  Charlie  sends  up  bows  and 
smiles,  and  wipes  the  beautiful  brow  he  so  openly  and 
wilfully  loves  best  on  earth.  Anna  smiles  back,  but 
Constance  bids  her  look  at  Maxime,  Victorine's  father, 
whom  neither  his  long  white  moustaches  nor  weight  of 
years  nor  the  lawless  past  revealed  in  his  daring  eyes 
can  rob  of  his  youth.  So  Anna  looks,  and  when  she 
turns  again  to  Charlie  she  finds  him  sending  a  glance 
rife  with  conquest — not  his  first — up  to  Victorine,  who, 
without  meeting  it,  replies — as  she  has  done  to  each  one 
before  it — with  a  dreamy  smile  into  vacancy,  and  a 
faint  narrowing  of  her  almond  eyes. 

Captain  Kincaid  comes  ambling  back,  and  right  here 
in  the  throat  of  Royal  Street  faces  the  command.  The 
matter  is  explained  to  Madame  Valcour  by  a  stranger: 

"Now  at  the  captain's  word  all  the  cannoneers  will 
spring  down,  leaving  only  guns,  teams  and  drivers  at 
their  back,  and  line  up  facing  us.  The  captain  will 
dismount  and  ascend  to  the  balcony,  and  there  he  and 
the  young  lady,  whoever  she  is — "  He  waits,  hoping 
Madame  will  say  who  the  young  lady  is,  but  Madame 
only  smiles  for  him  to  proceed —  "  The  captain  and  she 
will  confront  each  other,  she  will  present  the  colors, 
he,  replying,  will  receive  them,  and — ah,  after  all!" 

58 


Mandeville  Bleeds 

The  thing  had  been  done  without  their  seeing  it,  and 
there  stood  the  whole  magnificent  double  line.  Cap 
tain  Kincaid  dismounted  and  had  just  turned  from  his 
horse  when  there  galloped  up  Royal  Street  from  the 
vanished  procession — Mandeville.  Slipping  and  clat 
tering,  he  reined  up  and  saluted:  "How  soon  can  Kin- 
caid's  Battery  be  completely  ready  to  go  into  camp?" 

"Now,  if  necessary." 

"It  will  receive  orders  to  move  at  seven  to-morrow 
morning!"  The  Creole's  fervor  amuses  the  rabble, 
and  when  Hilary  smiles  his  earnestness  waxes  to 
a  frown.  Kincaid  replies  lightly  and  the  rider  bends 
the  rein  to  wheel  away,  but  the  slippery  stones  have 
their  victim  at  last.  The  horse's  feet  spread  and 
scrabble,  his  haunches  go  low.  Constance  snatches 
both  Anna's  hands.  Ah !  by  good  luck  the  beast  is  up 
again!  Yet  again  the  hoofs  slip,  the  rider  reels,  and 
Charlie  and  a  comrade  dart  out  to  catch  him,  but  he 
recovers.  Then  the  horse  makes  another  plunge  and 
goes  clear  down  with  a  slam  and  a  slide  that  hurl  his 
master  to  the  very  sidewalk  and  make  a  hundred  pale 
women  cry  out. 

Constance  and  her  two  companions  bend  wildly 
from  the  balustrade,  a  sight  for  a  painter.  Across  the 
way  Flora,  holding  back  her  grandmother,  silently 
leans  out,  another  picture.  In  the  ranks  near  Charlie 
a  disarray  continues  even  after  Kincaid  has  got  the 
battered  Mandeville  again  into  the  saddle,  and  while 
Mandeville  is  rejecting  sympathy  with  a  begrimed  yet 
haughty  smile. 

"Keep  back,  ladies!"  pleads  Madame's  late  in 
formant,  holding  off  two  or  three  bodily.  "Ladies,  sit 

59 


KincaicTs  Battery 

down!  Will  you  please  to  keep  back!"  Flora  still 
leans  out.  Some  one  is  melodiously  calling: 

"Captain  Kincaid!"  It  is  Mrs.  Callender.  "Cap 
tain!"  she  repeats. 

He  smiles  up  and  at  last  meets  Anna's  eyes.  Flora 
sees  their  glances — angels  ascending  and  descending — 
and  a  wee  loop  of  ribbon  that  peeps  from  his  tightly 
buttoned  breast.  Otherwise  another  sight,  elsewhere, 
could  not  have  escaped  her,  though  it  still  escapes 
many. 

"Poor  boy!"  it  causes  two  women  behind  her  to  ex 
claim,  "poor  boy!"  but  Flora  pays  no  heed,  for  Hilary 
is  speaking  to  the  Callenders. 

"Nothing  broken  but  his  watch,"  he  gayly  comforts 
them  as  to  Mandeville. 

"  He's  bleeding ! "  moans  Constance,  very  white.  But 
Kincaid  softly  explains  in  his  hollowed  hands : 

"Only  his  nose!" 

The  nose's  owner  casts  no  upward  look.  Not  his  to 
accept  pity,  even  from  a  fiancee.  His  handkerchief 
dampened  "to  wibe  the  faze,"  two  bits  of  wet  paper 
"to  plug  the  noztriP," — he  could  allow  no  more! 

"First  blood  of  the  war!"  said  Hilary. 

"  Yez !  But " — the  flashing  warrior  tapped  his  sword 
— "nod  the  last!"  and  was  off  at  a  gallop,  while  Kin 
caid  turned  hurriedly  to  find  that  Charlie,  struck  by 
the  floundering  horse,  had  twice  fainted  away. 

In  the  balconies  the  press  grew  dangerous.  An 
urchin  intercepted  Kincaid  to  show  him  the  Callenders, 
who,  with  distressed  eyes,  pointed  him  to  their  carriage 
hurrying  across  Canal  Street. 

"For  Charlie  and  Flora!"  called  Anna.  They  could 
60 


Mandeville  Bleeds 

not  stir  "themselves"  for  the  crush;  but  yonder,  on 
Moody's  side,  the  same  kind  citizen  noticed  before  had 
taken  matters  in  hand: 

"Keep  back,  ladies!  Make  room!  Let  these  two 
ladies  out!"  He  squeezed  through  the  pack,  holding 
aloft  the  furled  colors,  which  all  this  time  had  been 
lying  at  Flora's  feet.  Her  anxious  eyes  were  on  them 
at  every  second  step  as  she  pressed  after  him  with 
the  grandmother  dangling  from  her  elbow. 

The  open  carriage  spun  round  the  battery's  right 
and  up  its  front  to  where  a  knot  of  comrades  hid  the 
prostrate  Charlie;  the  surgeon,  Kincaid,  and  Flora 
crouching  at  his  side,  the  citizen  from  the  balcony  still 
protecting  grandmamma,  and  the  gilded  eagle  of  the  un- 
presented  standard  hovering  over  all.  With  tender 
ease  Hilary  lifted  the  sufferer  and  laid  him  on  the 
carriage's  front  seat,  the  surgeon  passed  Madame  in 
and  sat  next  to  her,  but  to  Kincaid  Flora  exclaimed 
with  a  glow  of  heroic  distress : 

"Let  me  go  later — with  Anna!"  Her  eyes  over 
flowed — she  bit  her  lip — "I  must  present  the  flag!" 

A  note  of  applause  started,  a  protest  hushed  it,  and 
the  overbending  Callenders  and  the  distracted  Victorine 
heard  Hilary  admiringly  say: 

"Come!    Go!    You  belong  with  your  brother!" 

He  pressed  her  in.  For  an  instant  she  stood  while 
the  carriage  turned,  a  hand  outstretched  toward  the 
standard,  saying  to  Hilary  something  that  was  drowned 
by  huzzas;  then  despairingly  she  sank  into  her  seat 
and  was  gone  down  Royal  Street. 

"Attention!"  called  a  lieutenant,  and  the  ranks  were 
in  order.  To  the  holder  of  the  flag  Hilary  pointed  out 

61 


KincaicTs  Battery 

Anna,  lingered  for  a  word  with  his  subaltern,  and  then 
followed  the  standard  to  the  Calenders'  balcony. 


XIII 

THINGS   ANNA  COULD   NOT  WRITE 

"  CHARLIE  has  two  ribs  broken,  but  is  doing  well," 

ran  a  page  of  the  diary;  "so  well  that  Flora  and  Ma 
dame — who  bears  fatigue  wonderfully — let  Captain 
Irby  take  them,  in  the  evening,  to  see  the  illumination. 
For  the  thunderstorm,  which  sent  us  whirling  home  at 
midday,  was  followed  by  a  clear  evening  sky  and  an  air 
just  not  too  cool  to  be  fragrant. 

"I  cannot  write.  My  thoughts  jostle  one  another 
out  of  all  shape,  like  the  women  in  that  last  crush  after 
the  flag-presentation.  I  begged  not  to  have  to  take 
Flora's  place  from  her.  It  was  like  snatching  jewels 
off  her.  I  felt  like  a  robber!  But  in  truth  until  I  had 
the  flag  actually  in  my  hand  I  thought  we  were  only 
being  asked  to  take  care  of  it  for  a  later  day.  The 
storm  had  begun  to  threaten.  Some  one  was  trying 
to  say  to  me — 'off  to  camp  and  then  to  the  front/ 
and—'  must  have  the  flag  now/  and  still  I  said,  '  No, 
oh,  no!'  But  before  I  could  get  any  one  to  add  a 
syllable  there  was  the  Captain  himself  with  the  three 
men  of  the  color  guard  behind  him,  the  middle  one 
Victorine's  father.  I  don't  know  how  I  began,  but 
only  that  I  went  on  and  on  in  some  wild  way  till  I 
heard  the  applause  all  about  and  beneath  me,  and 
he  took  the  colors  from  me,  and  the  first  gust  of  the 
storm  puffed  them  half  open — gorgeously — and  the 

62 


Things  Anna  Could  Not  Write 

battery  hurrahed.  And  then  came  his  part.  He — I 
cannot  write  it." 

Why  not,  the  diary  never  explained,  but  what  oc 
curred  was  this: 

" Ladies  and  gentlemen  and  comrades  in  arms!" 
began  Hilary  and  threw  a  superb  look  all  round,  but 
the  instant  he  brought  it  back  to  Anna,  it  quailed,  and 
he  caught  his  breath.  Then  he  nerved  up  again.  To 
help  his  courage  and  her  own  she  forced  herself  to  gaze 
straight  into  his  eyes,  but  reading  the  affright  in  hers 
he  stood  dumb  and  turned  red. 

He  began  again:  "Ladies  and  gentlemen  and  com 
rades  in  arms!"  and  pulled  his  moustache,  and  smote 
and  rubbed  his  brow,  and  suddenly  drove  his  hand  into 
an  inside  pocket  and  snatched  out  a  slip  of  paper.  But 
what  should  come  trailing  out  with  it  but  a  long  loop  of 
ribbon!  As  he  pushed  it  back  he  dropped  the  paper, 
which  another  whiff  of  wind  flirted  straight  over  his 
head,  sent  it  circling  and  soaring  clear  above  Moody's 
store  and  dropped  it  down  upon  the  roof.  And  there 
gazed  Anna  and  all  that  multitude,  utterly  blank,  until 
the  martyr  himself  burst  into  a  laugh.  Then  a  thousand 
laughs  pealed  as  one,  and  he  stood  smiling  and  stroking 
back  his  hair,  till  his  men  began  to  cry,  "song!  song!" 

Upon  that  he  raised  the  flag  high  in  one  hand,  let  it 
balloon  to  the  wind,  made  a  sign  of  refusal,  and  all  at 
once  poured  out  a  flood  of  speech — pledges  to  Anna 
and  her  fellow-needlewomen — charges  to  his  men — 
hopes  for  the  cherished  cause — words  so  natural  and 
unadorned,  so  practical  and  soldier-like,  and  yet  so 
swiff,  that  not  a  breath  was  drawn  till  he  had  ended. 
But  then  what  a  shout! 

63 


KincaicTs  Battery 

It  was  over  in  a  moment.  The  great  black  cloud 
that  had  been  swelling  up  from  the  south  gave  its  first 
flash  and  crash,  and  everybody  started  pell-mell  for 
home.  The  speaker  stood  just  long  enough  for  a  last 
bow  to  Anna  while  the  guard  went  before  him  with  the 
colors.  Then  he  hurried  below  and  had  the  whole 
battery  trotting  down  Canal  Street  and  rounding  back 
on  its  farther  side,  with  the  beautiful  standard  fluttering 
to  the  storm,  before  the  Callenders  could  leave  the 
balcony. 

Canal  Street  that  evening  was  a  veritable  fairyland. 
When,  growing  tired  of  their  carriage,  the  Callenders 
and  Mandeville  walked,  and  Kincaid  unexpectedly 
joined  them,  fairyland  was  the  only  name  he  could  find 
for  it,  and  Anna,  in  response,  could  find  none  at  all. 
Mallard's,  Zimmerman's,  Clark's,  Levois's,  Larous- 
sini's,  Moody's,  Hyde  &  Goodrich's,  and  even  old 
Piffet's  were  all  aglow.  One  cannot  recount  half. 
Every  hotel,  every  club-house,  all  the  theatres,  all  the 
consul's  offices  in  Royal  and  Carondelet  streets,  the 
banks  everywhere,  Odd  Fellows'  Hall — with  the  Con 
tinentals  giving  their  annual  ball  in  it — and  so  forth 
and  so  on!  How  the  heart  was  exalted! 

But  when  the  heart  is  that  way  it  is  easy  to  say  things 
prematurely,  and  right  there  in  Canal  Street  Hilary 
spoke  of  love.  Not  personally,  only  at  large ;  although 
when  Anna  restively  said  no  woman  should  ever  give 
her  heart  where  she  could  not  give  a  boundless  and  un 
shakable  trust,  his  eyes  showed  a  noble  misery  while 
he  exclaimed: 

"  Oh,  but  there  are  women  of  whom  no  man  can  ever 
deserve  that!"  There  his  manner  was  all  at  once  so 

64 


Things  Anna  Could  Not  Write 

personal  that  she  dared  not  be  silent,  but  fell  to  general 
izing,  with  many  a  stammer,  that  a  woman  ought  to 
be  very  slow  to  give  her  trust  if,  once  giving  it,  she 
would  not  rather  die  than  doubt. 

"Do  you  believe  there  are  such  women?"  he  asked. 

"I  know  there  are,"  she  said,  her  eyes  lifted  to  his, 
but  the  next  instant  was  so  panic-smitten  and  shamed 
that  she  ran  into  a  lamp-post.  And  when  he  called 
that  his  fault  her  denial  was  affirmative  in  its  feeble 
ness,  and  with  the  others  she  presently  resumed  the 
carriage  and  said  good-night. 

"Flippantly!"  thought  the  one  left  alone  on  the 
crowded  sidewalk. 

Yet — "It  is  I  who  am  going  to  have  the  hardest  of 
it,"  said  the  diary  a  short  hour  after.  "I've  always 
thought  that  when  the  right  one  came  I'd  never  give  in 
the  faintest  bit  till  I  had  put  him  to  every  test  and  task 
and  delay  I  could  invent.  And  now  I  can't  invent  one ! 
His  face  quenches  doubt,  and  if  he  keeps  on  this  way — 
Ah,  Flora !  is  he  anything  to  you  ?  Every  time  he  speaks 
my  heart  sees  you.  I  see  you  now !  And  somehow — 
since  Charlie's  mishap — more  yours  than  his  if " 

For  a  full  minute  the  pen  hovered  over  the  waiting 
page,  then  gradually  left  it  and  sank  to  rest  on  its  silver 
rack. 


XIV 

FLORA  TAPS   GRANDMA'S   CHEEK 

MEANWHILE,  from  a  cluster  of  society  folk  sipping 
ices  at  "Vincent's"  balcony  tables,  corner  of  Caron- 
delet  Street  (where  men  made  the  most  money),  and 
Canal  (where  women  spent  the  most),  Flora  and  her 
grandmother,  in  Irby's  care,  made  their  way  down  to 
the  street. 

Kincaid,  once  more  on  horseback  with  General 
Brodnax,  saw  them  emerge  beside  his  cousin's  hired 
carriage,  and  would  have  hurried  to  them,  if  only  to 
inquire  after  the  injured  boy;  but  the  General  gave 
what  he  was  saying  a  detaining  energy.  It  was  of 
erecting  certain  defences  behind  Mobile;  of  the  scarcity 
of  military  engineers;  and  of  his  having,  to  higher 
authority,  named  Hilary  for  the  task.  The  Captain 
could  easily  leave  the  battery  in  camp  for  a  day  or  two, 
take  the  Mobile  boat —  He  ceased  an  instant  and 
scowled,  as  Hilary  bowed  across  the  way. 

There  was  a  tender  raillery  in  the  beam  with  which 
Flora  held  the  young  man's  eye  a  second,  and  as  she 
turned  away  there  was  accusation  in  the  faint  toss  and 
flicker  of  the  deep  lace  that  curtained  her  hat.  Both 
her  companions  saw  it,  but  Irby  she  filled  with  an  in 
stant  inebriation  by  one  look,  the  kindest  she  had  ever 
given  him. 

"Both  barrels!"  said  the  old  lady  to  herself. 

As  Irby  reached  the  carriage  door  Flora's  touch 
arrested  him.  It  was  as  light  as  a  leaf,  but  it  thrilled 
him  like  wine — whose  thrill  he  well  knew. 

66 


Flora  Taps  Grandma's  Cheek 

"I've  lost  one  of  my  gloves/'  she  said. 

He  looked  about  her  feet. 

"You  mus'  have  drop'  it  on  the  stair,"  said  grand 
mamma,  discerning  the  stratagem,  and  glad  to  aid  it. 

Problem  in  tactics :  To  hunt  the  glove  all  the  way  up 
to  the  balcony  and  return  before  Hilary,  if  he  was  com 
ing,  could  reach  Flora's  side.  Irby  set  his  teeth — he 
loathed  problems — and  sprang  up  the  steps. 

"No  use,"  chanted  Madame  with  enjoyment;  "the 
other  one  is  not  coming." 

But  Flora  remained  benign  while  the  old  lady  drew  a 
little  mocking  sigh.  "Ah,"  said  the  latter,  "if  the 
General  would  only  stop  changing  his  mind  about  his 
two  nephews,  what  a  lot  of  hard  work  that  would  save 
you!" 

"It  isn't  hard!"  cried  Flora;  so  radiantly  that  pass 
ing  strangers  brightened  back,  "I  love  it!" 

"It!"  mocked  the  grandmother  as  the  girl  passed 
her  into  the  carriage.  "It!" 

"You  poor  tired  old  thing!"  sighed  the  compassion 
ate  beauty.  "Never  mind,  dear;  how  the  General  may 
choose  no  longer  gives  me  any  anxiety." 

"Oh,  you  lie!" 

"No,"  softly  laughed  the  girl,  "not  exactly.  Don't 
collapse,  love,  you'll  get  your  share  of  the  loot  yet.  My 
choice  shall  fit  the  General's  as  this  glove  (drawing  on 
the  one  Irby  was  still  away  in  search  of)  fits  this 
hand." 

Madame  smiled  her  contempt:  "Nevertheless  you 
will  risk  all  just  to  show  Anna " 

Flora  made  a  gesture  of  delight  but  harkened  on 

"That  she  cannot  have  her  Captain  till " 

67 


Kincaid's  Battery 

"Till  I'm  sure  I  don't  want  him!"  sang  the  girl. 

"Which  will  never  be!"  came  the  quiet  response. 

The  maiden  flushed:  "On  the  contrary,  my  dear,  I 
was  just  going  to  say,  you  will  please  begin  at  once  to 
be  more  civil  to  our  Captain — Irby." 

Madame  gazed:  "My  God!" 

"Ho!"  said  Flora,  "I'd  rather  somebody  else's." 
She  cheerily  smoothed  the  bonnet-bows  under  the  old 
lady's  chin:  Now,  chere,  you  know  the  assets  are  all 
you  care  for — even  if  with  them  you  have  to  take  a 
nincompoop  for  a  grandson." 

She  was  laughing  merrily  when  Irby  reappeared  in 
the  crowd,  motioning  that  he  had  found  nothing.  Her 
gloved  hands  raised  in  fond  apology,  and  Hilary's  ab 
sence,  appeased  him,  and  he  entered  the  vehicle. 

So  to  Jackson  Square,  where  it  was  good-by  to  Irby 
and  the  carriage,  and  Age  and  Beauty  climbed  their 
staircase  together.  "To-morrow's  Saturday,"  gayly 
sighed  the  girl.  "  I've  a  good  mind  to  lie  abed  till  noon, 
counting  up  the  week's  successes." 

"Especially  to-day's,"  smirked  weary  Age. 

"Ho-o-oh!"  laughed  the  maiden,  "you  and  to-day 
be ."  The  rest  was  whispered  close,  with  a  one- 
fingered  tap  on  the  painted  cheek.  In  the  gloom  of  the 
upper  landing  she  paused  to  murmur,  "hear  this:  Two 
things  I  have  achieved  this  week  worth  all  to-day's  bad 
luck  ten  times  over — you  don't  believe  me?" 

"No,  you  pretty  creature;  you  would  have  told  me 
sooner,  if  only  for  vanity." 

"I  swear  to  you  it  is  true!"  whispered  the  lithe 
boaster,  with  a  gleeful  quiver  from  head  to  foot.  "Lis 
ten!  First — purely,  of  course,  for  love  of  Anna — I 

68 


Flora  Taps  Grandma's  Cheek 

have  conspired  with  the  General  to  marry  her  to  Kin- 
caid.  And,  second,  also  purely  for  love  of  her,  I  have 
conspired  with  Irby  to  keep  her  and  Kincaid  forever 
and  a  day  apart!" 

She  tapped  both  the  aged  cheeks  at  once:  "I  hate  to 
share  anything  so  delicious  with  you,  but  I  must,  be 
cause " 

"Ah-h!  because,  as  usual " 

"Yes!  yes,  you  sweet  old  pelican!  because  you  are 
to  turn  the  crank!  But  it's  all  for  love  of  Anna.  Ah, 
there's  no  inspiration  like  exasperation!" 

"Except  destitution!"  said  the  grandmother. 

They  came  before  Charlie  with  arms  about  each 
other  and  openly  enjoyed  his  only  comment — a  scornful 
rounding  of  his  eyes. 

In  the  Callender  house,  as  the  stair  clock  sounded 
the  smallest  hour  of  the  night,  Miranda,  seeing  the 
chink  under  Anna's  door  to  be  still  luminous,  stole  to 
the  spot,  gently  rapped,  and  winning  no  response 
warily  let  herself  in. 

From  the  diary  on  her  desk  Anna  lifted  her  cheek, 
looked  up,  reclosed  her  lids,  smiled  and  reopened  them. 
Miranda  took  the  blushing  face  between  her  palms, 
and  with  quizzing  eyes — and  nose — inquired: 

"Is  there  any  reason  under  heaven  why  Anna  Cal 
lender  shouldn't  go  to  bed  and  have  glad  dreams?" 

"None  that  I  know  of,"  said  Anna. 


69 


XV 

THE  LONG  MONTH  OF  MARCH 

Ole  mahs'  love'  wine,  ole  mis'  love'  silk, 

De  piggies,  dey  loves  buttehmilk, 
An'  eveh  sence  dis  worF  began, 

De  ladies  loves  de  ladies'  man. 

I  loves  to  sing  a  song  to  de  ladies! 

I  loves  to  dance  along  o'  de  ladies! 

Whilse  eveh  I  can  breave  aw  see  aw  stan' 

Fs  bound  to  be  a  ladies'  man. 

So  sang  Captain  Hilary  Kincaid  at  the  Mandeville- 
Callender  wedding  feast,  where  his  uncle  Brodnax, 
with  nearly  every  one  we  know,  was  present.  Hilary 
had  just  been  second  groomsman,  with  Flora  for  his 
"file  leader,"  as  he  said,  meaning  second  bridesmaid. 
He  sat  next  her  at  table,  with  Anna  farthest  away. 

Hardly  fortunate  was  some  one  who,  conversing 
with  the  new  Miss  Callender,  said  the  charm  of  Kin 
caid 's  singing  was  that  the  song  came  from  "the  entire 
man."  She  replied  that  just  now  it  really  seemed  so! 
In  a  sense  both  comments  were  true,  and  yet  never  in 
the  singer's  life  had  so  much  of  "the  entire  man"  re 
fused  to  sing.  All  that  night  of  the  illumination. he  had 
not  closed  his  eyes,  except  in  anguish  for  having  tried 
to  make  love  on  the  same  day  when — and  to  the  same 
Anna  Callender  before  whom — he  had  drawn  upon 
himself  the  roaring  laugh  of  the  crowded  street;  or  in 
a  sort  of  remorse  for  letting  himself  become  the  rival 
of  a  banished  friend  who,  though  warned  that  a  whole 
platoon  of  him  would  make  no  difference,  suddenly 

70 


The  Long  Month  of  March 

seemed  to  plead  a  prohibitory  difference  to  one's  in 
most  sense  of  honor. 

At  dawn  he  had  risen  resolved  to  make  good  his  boast 
and  "  fight  like  a  whale."  Under  orders  of  his  own 
seeking  he  had  left  the  battery  the  moment  its  tents 
were  up  and  had  taken  boat  for  Mobile.  Whence  he 
had  returned  only  just  in  time  to  stand  beside  Flora 
Valcour,  preceded  by  a  relative  of  the  bridegroom 
paired  with  Anna. 

Yet  here  at  the  feast  none  was  merrier  than  Kincaid, 
who,  charmingly  egged  on  by  Flora,  kept  those  about 
him  in  gales  of  mirth,  and  even  let  himself  be  "cajoled" 
(to  use  his  own  term)  into  singing  this  song  whose 
title  had  become  his  nickname.  Through  it  all  Anna 
smiled  and  laughed  with  the  rest  and  clapped  for  each 
begged-for  stanza.  Yet  all  the  time  she  said  in  her  heart, 
"He  is  singing  it  at  me!" 

De  squir'l  he  love'  de  hick'ry  tree, 

De  clover  love'  de  bummle-bee, 
De  flies,  dey  loves  mullasses,  an'— 
De  ladies  loves  de  ladies'  man. 
I  loves  to  be  de  beau  o'  de  ladies! 
I  loves  to  shake  a  toe  wid  de  ladies! 
Whilse  eveh  I'm  alive,  on  wateh  aw  Ian', 
I's  bound  to  be  a  ladies'  man. 

The  General,  seeing  no  reason  why  Hilary  should 
not  pay  Anna  at  least  the  attentions  he  very  properly 
paid  his  "file  leader,"  endured  the  song  with  a  smile, 
but  took  revenge  when  he  toasted  the  bride: 

"In  your  prayers  to-night,  my  dear  Constance,  just 
thank  God  your  husband  is,  at  any  rate,  without  the 
sense  of  humor —  Stop,  my  friends!  Let  me  finish!" 


Kincaid's  Battery 

A  storm  of  laughter  was  falling  upon  Mandeville,  but 
the  stubborn  General  succeeded  after  all  in  diverting 
it  to  Hilary,  to  whom  in  solemn  mirth  he  pointed  as — 
11 that  flirtatious  devotee  of  giddiness,  without  a  fault 
big  enough  to  make  him  interesting!"  ["Hoh!" — 
"Hoh!" — from  men  and  maidens  who  could  easily 
have  named  huge  ones.]  Silent  Anna  knew  at  least 
two  or  three;  was  it  not  a  fault  a  hundred  times  too 
grave  to  be  uninteresting,  for  a  big  artillerist  to  take  a 
little  frightened  lassie  as  cruelly  at  her  word  as  he  was 
doing  right  here  and  now? 

Interesting  to  her  it  was  that  his  levity  still  remained 
unsubmerged,  failing  him  only  in  a  final  instant :  Their 
hands  had  clasped  in  leave-taking  and  her  eyes  were 
lifted  to  his,  when  some  plea  with  which  "the  entire 
man"  seemed  overcharged  to  the  very  lips  was  suddenly, 
subtly,  and  not  this  time  by  disconcertion,  but  by  self- 
mastery,  withheld.  Irby  put  in  a  stiff  good-by,  and  as 
he  withdrew,  Hilary  echoed  only  the  same  threadbare 
word  more  brightly,  and  was  gone;  saying  to  himself 
as  he  looked  back  from  the  garden's  outmost  bound : 

"She's  cold;  that's  what's  the  matter  with  Anna; 
cold  and  cruel!" 

Tedious  was  the  month  of  March.  Mandeville 
devise'  himself  a  splandid  joke  on  that,  to  the  effect 
that  soon  enough  there  would  be  months  of  tedieuse 
marches — ha,  ha,  ha ! — and  contribute'  it  to  the 
news-pape'.  Yet  the  tedium  persisted.  Always  some 
thing  about  to  occur,  nothing  ever  occurring.  Another 
vast  parade,  it  is  true,  some  two  days  after  the  marriage, 
to  welcome  from  Texas  that  aged  general  (friend  of 
the  Callenders)  who  after  long  suspense  to  both  sides 

72 


The  Long  Month  of  March 

had  at  last  joined  the  South,  and  was  to  take  command 
at  New  Orleans.  Also,  consequent  upon  the  bursting 
of  a  gun  that  day  in  Kincaid's  Battery,  the  funeral 
procession  of  poor,  handsome,  devil-may-care  Felix  de 
Gruy;  saxhorns  moaning  and  wailing,  drums  muttering 
from  their  muffled  heads,  Anna's  ensign  furled  in  black, 
captain  and  lieutenants  on  foot,  brows  inclined,  sabres 
reversed,  and  the  "  Stars  and  Bars,"  new  flag  of  the 
Confederacy,  draping  the  slow  caisson  that  bore  him 
past  the  Calenders'  gates  in  majesty  so  strange  for 
the  gay  boy. 

Such  happenings,  of  course;  but  nothing  that  ever 
brought  those  things  for  which  one,  wakening  in  the 
night,  lay  and  prayed  while  forced  by  the  songster's 
rapture  to  "listen  to  the  mocking-bird." 

While  the  Judge  lived  the  Callenders  had  been  used 
to  the  company  of  men  by  the  weight  of  whose  energies 
and  counsel  the  clock  of  public  affairs  ran  and  kept 
time;  senators,  bishops,  bank  presidents,  great  lawyers, 
leading  physicians;  a  Dr.  Sevier,  for  one.  Some  of 
these  still  enjoyed  their  hospitality,  and  of  late  in  the 
old  house  life  had  recovered  much  of  its  high  charm 
and  breadth  of  outlook.  Yet  March  was  tedious. 

For  in  March  nearly  all  notables  felt  bound  to  be  up 
at  Montgomery  helping  to  rock  the  Confederacy's 
cradle.  Whence  came  back  sad  stories  of  the  incapa 
city,  negligence,  and  bickerings  of  misplaced  men.  It 
was  "  almost  as  bad  as  at  Washington."  Friends  still 
in  the  city  were  tremendously  busy;  yet  real  business — 
Commerce — with  scarce  a  moan  of  complaint,  lay 
heaving  out  her  dying  breath.  Busy  at  everything  but 
business,  these  friends,  with  others  daily  arriving  in 

73 


Kincaid's  Battery 

command  of  rustic  volunteers,  kept  society  tremendously 
gay,  by  gaslight;  and  courage  and  fortitude  and  love 
of  country  and  trust  in  God  and  scorn  of  the  foe  went 
clad  in  rainbow  colors;  but  at  the  height  of  all  manner 
of  revels  some  pessimist  was  sure  to  explain  to  Anna 
why  the  war  must  be  long,  of  awful  cost,  and  with  a 
just  fighting  chance  to  win. 

"Then  why  do  we  not  turn  about  right  here?" 

"Too  late  now." 

Such  reply  gave  an  inward  start,  it  seemed  so  fitted 
to  her  own  irrevealable  case.  But  it  was  made  to  many 
besides  her,  and  women  came  home  from  dinings  or 
from  operas  and  balls  for  the  aid  of  this  or  that  new 
distress  of  military  need,  and  went  up  into  the  dark 
and  knelt  in  all  their  jewels  and  wept  long.  In  March 
the  poor,  everywhere,  began  to  be  out  of  work,  and  re 
cruiting  to  be  lively  among  them  too,  because  for  thou 
sands  of  them  it  was  soldier's  pay  or  no  bread.  Among 
the  troops  from  the  country  death  had  begun  to  reap 
great  harvests  ere  a  gun  was  fired,  and  in  all  the  camps 
lovers  nightly  sang  their  lugubrious  "Lorena,"  feeling 
that  "a  hundred  months  had  passed"  before  they  had 
really  dragged  through  one.  March  was  so  tedious, 
and  lovers  are  such  poor  arithmeticians.  Wherever 
Hilary  Kincaid  went,  showing  these  how  to  cast  can 
non  (that  would  not  burst),  those  where  to  build  forti 
fications,  and  some  how  to  make  unsickly  camps,  that 
song  was  begged  of  him  in  the  last  hour  before  sleep; 
last  song  but  one,  the  very  last  being  always — that  least 
liked  by  Anna. 

Tedious  to  Kincaid's  Battery  were  his  absences  on 
so  many  errands.  Behind  a  big  earthwork  of  their 

74 


The  Long  Month  of  March 

own  construction  down  on  the  river's  edge  of  the  old 
battle  ground,  close  beyond  the  Callenders',  they  lay 
camped  in  pretty  white  tents  that  seemed  to  Anna,  at 
her  window,  no  bigger  than  visiting-cards.  Rarely  did 
she  look  that  way  but  the  fellows  were  drilling,  their 
brass  pieces  and  their  officers'  drawn  sabres  glinting 
back  the  sun,  horses  and  men  as  furiously  diligent  as 
big  and  little  ants,  and  sometimes,  of  an  afternoon, 
their  red  and  yellow  silk  and  satin  standard  unfurled — 
theirs  and  hers.  Of  evenings  small  bunches  of  the  boys 
would  call  to  chat  and  be  sung  to;  to  threaten  to  desert 
if  not  soon  sent  to  the  front;  and  to  blame  all  delays 
on  colonels  and  brigadiers  "known"  by  them  to  be 
officially  jealous  of —  They  gave  only  the  tedious  nick 
name. 

"Why  belittle  him  with  that?"  queried  Miranda, 
winning  Anna's  silent  gratitude. 

"It  doesn't  belittle  him,"  cried  Charlie.  "That's  the 
joke.  It  makes  him  loom  larger!" 

Others  had  other  explanations:  Their  guns  were 
"ladies'  guns!"  Were  the  guns  the  foremost  cause? 
Some  qualified:  "Foremost,  yes;  fundamental,  no. 
Rather  the  fact  that  never  was  a  woman  cited  in  male 
gossip  but  instantly  he  was  her  champion;  or  that  no 
woman  ever  brought  a  grievance  to  any  camp  where  he 
might  be  but  she  wanted  to  appeal  it  to  him. 

Anna  "thought  the  name  was  all  from  the  song." 

"Oh,  fully  as  much  from  his  hundred  and  one  other 
songs!  Had  he  never  sung  to  her — 

"I'd  offer  thee  this  hand  of  mine "  ? 

Frankly,  it  was  agreed,  he  did  most  laughably  love 

75 


Kincaid's  Battery 

ladies'  company;  that  he  could  always  find  it,  as  a 
horse  can  find  water;  that  although  no  evening  in  their 
society  could  be  so  gay  or  so  long  that  he  would  not  be 
certain  to  work  harder  next  day  than  any  one  else,  no 
day  could  be  so  cruelly  toilsome  that  he  could  not  spend 
half  the  next  night  dancing  with  the  girls;  and  lastly, 
that  with  perfect  evenness  and  a  boyish  modesty  he 
treated  them  all  alike. 

Anna  laughed  with  the  rest,  but  remembered  three 
separate  balls  to  which,  though  counted  on,  he  had  not 
come,  she  uninformed  that  military  exigencies  had  at 
the  last  moment  curtly  waved  him  off,  and  he  unaware 
that  these  exigencies  had  been  created  by  Irby  under 
inspiration  from  the  daintiest  and  least  self-assertive 
tactician  in  or  about  New  Orleans. 


XVI 

CONSTANCE  TRIES  TO  HELP 

ONE  day,  in  Canal  Street,  Kincaid  met  "Smellemout 
and  Ketchem."  It  was  pleasant  to  talk  with  men  of 
such  tranquil  speech.  He  proposed  a  glass  of  wine, 
but  just  then  they  were  "strictly  temperance."  They 
alluded  familiarly  to  his  and  Greenleaf's  midnight  ad 
venture.  The  two  bull-drivers,  they  said,  were  still 
unapprehended. 

Dropping  to  trifles  they  mentioned  a  knife,  a  rather 
glittering  gewgaw,  which,  as  evidence,  ought 

"Oh,  that  one!"  said  Hilary.  "Yes,  I  have  it,  mud, 
glass  jewels  and  all.  No,"  he  laughed,  "I  can  keep  it 
quite  as  safely  as  you  can." 

76 


Constance  Tries  to  Help 

So  they  passed  to  a  larger  matter.  "  For,  really,  as  to 
Gibbs  and  Lafontaine " 

"You  can't  have  them  either,"  interrupted  their 
Captain,  setting  the  words  to  a  tune.  Then  only  Ks 
melodiously— "No,  sir-ee!  Why,  gentlemen,  they 
weren't  trying  to  kill  the  poor  devil,  he  was  trying  to 
kill  them,  tell  your  Committee  of  Public  Safety.  And 
tell  them  times  are  changed.  You  can  take  Sam  and 
Maxime,  of  course,  if  you  can  take  the  whole  battery; 
we're  not  doing  a  retail  business.  By  the  by — did  you 
know  ? — 'twas  Sam's  gun  broke  the  city's  record,  last 
week,  for  rapid  firing!  Funny,  isn't  it! — Excuse  me,  I 
must  speak  to  those  ladies." 

The  ladies,  never  prettier,  were  Mrs.  Callender  and 
Constance.  They  were  just  reentering,  from  a  shop, 
their  open  carriage.  In  amiable  reproach  they  called 
him  a  stranger,  yet  with  bewitching  resignation  accepted 
and  helped  out  his  lame  explanations. 

"You  look — "  began  Constance — but  "careworn" 
was  a  risky  term  and  she  stopped.  He  suggested 
"weather-beaten,"  and  the  ladies  laughed. 

"Yes,"  they  said,  "even  they  were  overtasked  with 
patriotic  activities,  and  Anna  had  almost  made  herself 
ill.  Nevertheless  if  he  would  call  he  should  see  her  too. 
Oh,  no,  not  to-day;  no,  not  to-morrow;  but — well — 
the  day  after."  (Miss  Valcour  passed  so  close  as  to 
hear  the  appointment,  but  her  greeting  smile  failed  to 
draw  their  attention.)  "And  oh,  then  you  must  tell  us 
all  about  that  fearful  adventure  in  which  you  saved 
Lieutenant  Greenleaf's  life!  Ah,  we've  heard,  just 
heard,  in  a  letter"  The  horses  danced  with  impa 
tience.  "We  shall  expect  you!" 

77 


KincaicTs  Battery 

As  they  drove  into  Royal  Street  with  Constance  rap 
turously  pressing  Miranda's  hand  the  latter  tried  vainly 
to  exchange  bows  with  a  third  beauty  and  a  second 
c,  ~^tain,  but  these  were  busy  meeting  each  other  in 
bright  surprise  and  espied  the  carriage  only  when  it 
had  passed. 

Might  the  two  not  walk  together  a  step  or  so  ?  With 
pleasure.  They  were  Flora  and  Irby.  Presently — 

"Do  you  know,"  she  asked,  "where  your  cousin 
proposes  to  be  day  after  to-morrow  evening — in  case 
you  should  want  to  communicate  with  him?" 

He  did  not.     She  told  him. 


XVII 

"OH,  CONNIE,  DEAR NOTHING GO    ON" 

THE  third  evening  came.  On  all  the  borders  of 
dear  Dixie  more  tents  than  ever  whitened  sea-shores  and 
mountain  valleys,  more  sentinels  paced  to  and  fro  in 
starlight  or  rain,  more  nfers  and  trumpeters  woke  the 
echoes  with  strains  to  enliven  fortitude,  more  great 
guns  frowned  silently  at  each  other  over  more  parapets, 
and  more  thousands  of  lovers  reclined  about  camp 
fires  with  their  hearts  and  fancies  at  home,  where 
mothers  and  maidens  prayed  in  every  waking  moment 
for  God's  mercy  to  keep  the  brave  truants;  and  with 
remembrance  of  these  things  Anna  strove  to  belittle  her 
own  distress  while  about  the  library  lamp  she  and 
Miranda  seemed  each  to  be  reading  a  book,  and  Con 
stance  the  newspaper  sent  from  Charleston  by  Mande- 
ville. 


"Oh,  Connie,  Dear-Nothing-Go  On" 

Out  in  the  mellow  night  a  bird  sang  from  the  tip-top 
of  a  late-blooming  orange  tree,  and  inside,  away  inside, 
inside  and  through  and  through  the  poor  girl's  heart, 
the  " years" — which  really  were  nothing  but  the  mantel 
clock's  quarter-hours — "crept  slowly  by." 

At  length  she  laid  her  book  aside,  softly  kissed  each 
seated  companion,  and  ascended  to  her  room  and 
window.  There  she  stood  long  without  sound  or  mo 
tion,  her  eyes  beyond  the  stars,  her  head  pressed  wearily 
against  the  window  frame.  Then  the  lids  closed  while 
her  lips  formed  soft  words: 

"  Oh,  God,  he  is  not  coming ! "  Stillness  again.  And 
then —  "Oh,  let  me  believe  yet  that  only  Thy  hand 
keeps  him  away !  Is  it  to  save  him  for  some  one  fairer 
and  better?  God,  I  ask  but  to  know!  I'm  a  rebel, 
but  not  against  Thee,  dear  Lord.  I  know  it's  a  sin  for 
me  to  suffer  this  way;  Thou  dost  not  owe  me  happiness; 
I  owe  it  Thee.  Oh,  God,  am  I  clamoring  for  my 
week's  wages  before  I've  earned  an  hour's  pay?  Yet 
oh!  yet  oh!" — the  head  rocked  heavily  on  its  support — 
"if  only— if  only " 

She  started — listened!  A  gate  opened — shut.  She 
sprang  to  her  glass  and  then  from  it.  In  soft  haste  she 
needlessly  closed  the  window  and  drew  its  shade  and 
curtains.  She  bathed  her  eyelids  and  delicately  dried 
them.  At  the  mirror  again  she  laid  deft  touches  on 
brow  and  crown,  harkening  between  for  any  mes 
senger's  step,  and  presently,  without  reason,  began  to 
set  the  room  more  exquisitely  to  rights.  Now  she  faced 
the  door  and  stood  attentive,  and  now  she  took  up  a 
small  volume  and  sat  down  by  her  lamp. 

A  tap :  Constance  entered,  beaming  only  too  tenderly. 

79 


Kincaid's  Battery 

"It  was  better,  wasn't  it,"  she  asked,  hovering,  "to 
come  than  to  send?" 

"Why,  of  course,  dear;  it  always  is." 

A  meditative  silence  followed.  Then  Anna  languidly 
inquired,  "Who  is  it?" 

"Nobody  but  Charlie." 

The  inquirer  brightened:  "And  why  isn't  Charlie 
as  good  as  any  one?" 

"He  is,  to-night,"  replied  the  elder  beauty,  "except 
— the  one  exception." 

"Oh,  Connie" — a  slight  flush  came  as  the  seated  girl 
smilingly  drew  her  sister's  hands  down  to  her  bosom — 
"there  isn't  any  one  exception,  and  there's  not  going  to 
be  any.  Now,  that  smile  is  downright  mean  of  you!" 

The  offender  atoned  with  a  kiss  on  the  brow. 

"Why  do  you  say,"  asked  its  recipient,  "'as  good  as 
any  one,  to-night'?" 

"Because,"  was  the  soft  reply,  "to-night  he  comes 
from — the  other — to  explain  why  the  other  couldn't 
come." 

"Why!" — the  flush  came  back  stronger — "why,  Con 
nie!  why,  that's  positively  silly — ha,  ha,  ha!" 

"I  don't  see  how,  Nan." 

"My  dear  Con!  Isn't  his  absence  equally  and  per 
fectly  innocent  whether  he  couldn't  come  or  wouldn't 
come?  But  an  explanation  sent! — by  courier! — to — 
to  shorten — ah,  ha,  ha! — to  shorten  our  agony!  Why, 
Con,  wouldn't  you  have  thought  better  of  him  than 
that?  H-oh,  me!  What  a  man's  'bound  to  be'  I 
suppose  he's  bound  to  be.  What  is  the  precious  ex 
planation?" 

With  melting  eyes  Constance  shook  her  head.  "  You 
80 


"Oh,  Connie,  Dear— Nothing— Go  On" 

don't  deserve  to  hear  it,"  she  replied.  Her  tears  came: 
"My  little  sister,  I'm  on  the  man's  side  in  this  affair!" 

"That's  not  good  of  you,"  murmured  Anna. 

"I  don't  claim  to  be  good.  But  there's  one  thing, 
Nan  Callender,  I  never  did;  I  never  chained  up  my 
lover  to  see  if  he'd  stay  chained.  When  Steve " 

"Oh-h!  Oh-h!"  panted  Anna,  "you're  too  cruel! 
Hilary  Kincaid  wears  no  chain  of  mine!" 

"Oh,  yes,  he  does!  He's  broken  away,  but  he's 
broken  away,  chain  and  all,  to  starve  and  perish,  as 
one  look  into  his  face  would  show  you!" 

"He  doesn't  show  his  face.    He  sends " 

"An  explanation.  Yes.  Which  first  you  scorn  and 
then  consent  to  hear." 

"  Don't  scorn  me,  Connie.    What's  the  explanation  ?  " 

"It's  this:  he's  been  sent  back  to  those  Mobile 
fortifications — received  the  order  barely  in  time  to  catch 
the  boat  by  going  instantly.  Nan,  the  Valcours'  house 
is  found  to  stand  right  on  their  proposed  line,  and  he's 
gone  to  decide  whether  the  line  may  be  changed  or  the 
house  must  be  demolished." 

Anna  rose,  twined  an  arm  in  her  sister's  and  with 
her  paced  the  chamber.  "How  perfectly  terrible!"  she 
murmured,  their  steps  ceasing  and  her  eyes  remote  in 
meditation.  "Poor  Flora!  Oh,  the  poor  old  lady! 
And  oh,  oh,  poor  Flora! —  But,  Con!  The  line  will 
be  changed!  He — you  know  what  the  boys  call  him'" 

"Yes,  but  there's  the  trouble.  He's  no  one  lady's 
man.  Like  Steve,  he's  so  absolutely  fair " 

"  Connie,  I  tell  you  it's  a  strange  line  he  won't  change 
for  Flora  Valcour!" 

"Now,  Nan  Callender!  The  line  will  go  where  it 
81 


KincaicTs  Battery 

ought  to  go.  By  the  by,  Charlie  says  neither  Flora 
nor  her  grandmother  knows  the  house  is  in  danger. 
Of  course,  if  it  is  harmed,  the  harm  will  be  paid  for." 

"Oh,  paid  for!" 

"Why,  Nan,  I'm  as  sorry  for  them  as  you.  But  / 
don't  forget  to  be  sorry  for  Hilary  Kincaid  too." 

"Connie" — walk  resumed,  speaker's  eyes  on  the 
floor — "if  you'd  only  see  that  to  me  he's  merely  very 
interesting — entertaining — nothing  more  whatever — I'd 
like  to  say  just  a  word  about  him." 

"Say  on,  precious." 

"Well — did  you  ever  see  a  man  so  fond  of  men?" 

"Oh,  of  course  he  is,  or  men  wouldn't  be  so  fond  of 
him." 

"/  think  he's  fonder  of  men  than  of  women!" 

Constance  smiled :  "  Do  you  ?  " 

"And  I  think,"  persisted  Anna,  "the  reason  some 
women  find  him  so  agreeable  is  that  our  collective 
society  is  all  he  asks  of  us,  or  ever  will  ask." 

"Nan  Callender,  look  me  in  the  eye!  You  can't! 
My  little  sister,  you've  got  a  lot  more  sense  than  I  have, 
and  you  know  it,  but  I  can  tell  you  one  thing.  When 
Steve  and  I " 

"Oh,  Connie,  dear — nothing — go  on." 

"I  won't!  Except  to  say  some  lovers  take  love  easy 
and  some — can't.  I  must  go  back  to  Charlie.  I 
know,  Nan,  it's  those  who  love  hardest  that  take  love 
hardest,  and  I  suppose  it's  born  in  Hilary  Kincaid, 
and  it's  born  in  you,  to  fight  it  as  you'd  fight  fire.  But, 
oh,  in  these  strange  times,  don't  do  it!  Don't  do  it. 
You're  going  to  have  trouble  a-plenty  without." 

The  pair,  moving  to  the  door  with  hands  on  each 
82 


Flora  Tells  the  Truth! 

other's  shoulders,  exchanged  a  melting  gaze.    "  Trouble 

a-plenty,"  softly  asked  Anna,  "why  do  you ?" 

"Oh,  why,  why,  why!"  cried  the  other,  with  a  sud 
den  gleam  of  tears.  "I  wish  you  and  Miranda  had 
never  learned  that  word." 


XVIII 

FLORA    TELLS   THE    TRUTH! 

You  ask  how  the  Valcour  ladies,  living  outwardly  so 
like  the  most  of  us  who  are  neither  scamps  nor  saints, 
could  live  by  moral  standards  so  different  from  those 
we  have  always  thought  essential  to  serenity  of  brow, 
sweetness  of  bloom  or  blitheness  of  companionship,  and 
yet  could  live  so  prettily — remain  so  winsome  and  un- 
scarred. 

Well,  neither  of  them  had  ever  morally  fallen  enough 
even  to  fret  the  brow.  It  is  the  fall  that  disfigures. 
They  had  lived  up  to  inherited  principles  (such  as  they 
were),  and  one  of  the  minor  of  these  was,  to  adapt 
their  contours  to  whatever  they  impinged  upon. 

We  covet  solidity  of  character,  but  Flora  and  Ma 
dame  were  essentially  fluid.  They  never  let  them 
selves  clash  with  any  one,  and  their  private  rufHings  of 
each  other  had  only  a  happy  effect  of  aerating  their 
depths,  and  left  them  as  mirror-smooth  and  thoroughly 
one  as  the  bosom  of  a  garden  lake  after  the  ripples 
have  died  behind  two  jostling  swans.  To  the  Callen- 
ders  society  was  a  delightful  and  sufficient  end.  To 
the  Valcours  it  was  a  means  to  all  kinds  of  ends,  as 
truly  as  commerce  or  the  industries,  and  yet  they  were 

83 


Kincaid's  Battery 

so  fragrantly  likable  that  to  call  them  accomplices 
seems  outrageous — clogs  the  pen.  Yes,  they  were 
actors,  but  you  never  saw  that.  They  never  stepped 
out  of  their  parts,  and  they  had  this  virtue,  if  it  is  one : 
that  behind  all  their  roles  they  were  staunchly  for  each 
other  in  every  pinch.  When  Kincaid  had  been  away  a 
few  days  this  second  time,  these  two  called  at  the  Cal- 
lender  house. 

To  none  was  this  house  more  interesting  than  to 
Flora.  In  her  adroit  mind  she  accused  it  of  harboring 
ancient  secrets  in  its  architecture,  shrewd  hiding-places 
in  its  walls.  Now  as  she  stood  in  the  panelled  drawing- 
rooms  awaiting  its  inmates,  she  pointed  out  to  her 
seated  companion  that  this  was  what  her  long-dead 
grandsire  might  have  made  their  own  home,  behind 
Mobile,  had  he  spent  half  on  its  walls  what  he  had 
spent  in  them  on  wine,  cards,  and " 

"Ah!"  chanted  the  old  lady,  with  a  fierce  glint  and 
a  mock-persuasive  smile,  "add  the  crowning  word,  the 
capsheaf.  You  have  the  stamina  to  do  it." 

"Women,"  said  the  girl  of  stamina  beamingly,  and 
went  floating  about,  peering  and  tapping  for  hollow 
places.  At  one  tap  her  eye,  all  to  itself,  danced;  but 
on  the  instant  Anna,  uninformed  of  their  presence,  and 
entering  with  a  vase  of  fresh  roses,  stood  elated.  Praise 
of  the  flowers  hid  all  confusion,  and  Flora,  with  laughing 
caresses  and  a  droll  hardihood  which  Anna  always  en 
joyed,  declared  she  would  gladly  steal  roses,  garden,  house 
and  all.  Anna  withdrew,  promising  instant  return. 

"Flora  dear!"  queried  the  grandmother  in  French, 
"why  did  you  tell  her  the  truth?  For  once  you  must 
have  been  disconcerted!" 

84 


Flora  Tells  the  Truth! 

The  sparkling  girl  laughed:  "Why,  isn't  that — with 
due  modifications — just  what  we're  here  for?" 

Madame  suddenly  looked  older,  but  quickly  bright 
ened  again  as  Flora  spoke  on:  "Don't  you  believe  the 
truth  is,  now  and  then,  the  most  effective  lie?  I've 
sometimes  inferred  you  did." 

The  old  lady  rather  enjoyed  the  gibe:  "My  dear,  I 
can  trust  you  never  to  give  any  one  an  overdose  of  it. 
Yet  take  care,  you  gave  it  a  bit  too  pure  just  now. 
Don't  ever  risk  it  so  on  that  fool  Constance,  she  has 
the  intuitive  insight  of  a  small  child — the  kind  you  lost 
so  early." 

The  two  exchanged  a  brief  admiring  glance.  "  Oh, 
I'm  all  right  with  Constance,"  was  the  reply.  "I'm 
cousin  to  'Steve'!" 

There  the  girl's  gayety  waned.  The  pair  were  at 
this  moment  in  desperate  need  of  money.  Mandeville 
was  one  of  the  old  coffee-planter's  descendants.  Had 
fate  been  less  vile,  thought  Flora,  this  house  might  have 
been  his,  and  so  hers  in  the  happy  event  of  his  demise. 
But  now,  in  such  case,  to  Constance,  as  his  widow, 
would  be  left  even  the  leavings,  the  overseer's  cottage; 
which  was  one  more  convenient  reason  for  detesting — 
not  him,  nor  Constance — that  would  be  to  waste  good 
ammunition;  but 

"Still  thinking  of  dear  Anna?"  asked  the  dame. 

The  maiden  nodded:  "Grandma" — a  meditative 
pause — "I  love  Anna.  Anna's  the  only  being  on  earth 
I  can  perfectly  trust." 

"Ahem!"  was  the  soft  rejoinder,  and  the  two  smi 
lingly  held  each  other's  gaze  for  the  larger  part  of  a 
minute.  Then  one  by  one  came  in  the  ladies  of 

85 


KincaicTs  Battery 

the  house,  and  it  was  kiss  and  chirrup  and  kiss 
again. 

"Cousin  Constance — ah,  ha,  ha! — cousin  Flora!" 

The  five  talked  of  the  wedding.  Just  to  think !  'Twas 
barely  a  month  ago,  they  said. 

Yet  how  much  had  occurred,  pursued  Miranda,  and 
how  many  things  hoped  and  longed  for  had  not  oc 
curred,  and  how  time  had  dragged!  At  those  words 
Flora  saw  Anna's  glance  steal  over  to  Miranda.  But 
Miranda  did  not  observe,  and  the  five  chatted  on. 
How  terrifying,  at  still  noon  of  the  last  Sabbath — 
everybody  in  church — had  been  that  explosion  of  the 
powder-mill  across  the  river.  The  whole  business 
blown  to  dust.  Nothing  but  the  bare  ground  left. 
Happily  no  workmen  there.  No,  not  even  a  watchman, 
though  the  city  was  well  known  to  be  full  of  the  enemy's 
" minions"  (Flora's  term).  Amazing  negligence,  all 
agreed.  Yet  only  of  a  piece — said  Constance — etc. 

And  how  sad  to  find  there  was  a  victim,  after  all, 
when  poor,  threadbare  old  Doctor  Visionary,  inventor 
of  the  machine-gun  and  a  new  kind  of  powder,  began 
to  be  missed  by  his  landlady,  there  being,  in  Captain 
Kincaid's  absence,  no  one  else  to  miss  him.  Yes,  it 
was  the  Captain  who  had  got  him  a  corner  to  work  in 
at  the  powder-mill.  So  much  the  worse  for  both. 
Now  plans,  models,  formulae,  and  inventor  were  gone  in 
that  one  flash  and  roar  that  shook  the  whole  city  and 
stopped  all  talk  of  Captain  Kincaid's  promotion  as  an 
earthquake  stops  a  clock. 

"Well,"  cried  Constance  to  Flora,  who  had  grown 
silent,  "the  battery  will  love  him  all  the  more!" 

"And  so  will  we  all!"  said  Madame,  also  to  Flora; 
86 


Flora  Romances 

and  Flora,  throwing  off  a  look  of  pain,  explained  to 
Anna,  "He  is  so  good  to  my  brother!" 

"Naturally,"  quizzed  Miranda,  with  her  merriest 
wrinkles.  Flora  sparkled,  made  a  pretty  face  at  her 
and  forced  a  change  of  theme;  gave  Anna's  roses  new 
praise,  and  said  she  had  been  telling  grandma  of  the 
swarms  of  them  in  the  rear  garden.  So  the  old  lady, 
whom  she  had  told  no  such  thing,  let  Constance  and 
Miranda  conduct  her  there.  But  Flora  softly  detained 
Anna,  and  the  moment  they  were  alone  seized  both  her 
hands.  Whereat  through  all  Anna's  frame  ran  despair, 
crying,  "He  has  asked  her!  He  has  asked  her!" 

XIX 

FLORA    ROMANCES 

"DEAREST,"  warily  exclaimed  the  Creole  beauty, 
with  a  sudden  excess  of  her  pretty  accent,  "I  am  in 
a  situation  perfectly  dreadful!" 

Anna  drew  her  to  a  sofa,  seeing  pictures  of  her  and 
Hilary  together,  and  tortured  with  a  belief  in  their  ex 
quisite  fitness  to  be  so.  "Can  I  help  you,  dear?"  she 
asked,  though  the  question  echoed  mockingly  within 
her. 

"Ah,  no,  except  with  advice,"  said  Flora,  "only  with 
advice!" 

"Ho-o-oh!  if  I  were  worthy  to  advise  you  it  wouldn't 
flatter  me  so  to  be  asked." 

"But  I  muz'  ask.  'Tis  only  with  you  that  I  know 
my  secret  will  be — to  everybody — and  forever — at  the 
bed  of  the  ocean.  You  can  anyhow  promise  me  that." 


Kincaid's  Battery 

"Yes,  I  can  anyhow  promise  you  that." 
"Then,"  said  Flora,  "let  me  speak  whiles—"  She 
dropped  her  face  into  her  hands,  lifted  it  again  and 
stared  into  her  listener's  eyes  so  piteously  that  through 
Anna  ran  another  cry — "He  has  not  asked!  No  girl 
alive  could  look  so  if  he  had  asked  her!" 

Flora  seemed  to  nerve  herself:  "Anna,  every  dollar 
we  had,  every  picayune  we  could  raise,  grandma  and  I, 

even  on  our  Mobile  house  and  our  few  best  jewels,  is — 
• jj 

"Oh,  what— what?    Not  lost?    Not— not  stolen?" 

"Blown  up!  Blown  up  with  that  poor  old  man  in 
the  powder-mill!" 

"Flora,  Flora!"  was  all  Anna,  in  the  shame  of  her 
rebuked  conjectures,  could  cry,  and  all  she  might  have 
cried  had  she  known  the  very  truth:  That  every  dollar, 
picayune,  and  other  resource  had  disappeared  gradually 
in  the  grist-mill  of  daily  need  and  indulgence,  and  never 
one  of  them  been  near  the  powder-mill,  the  poor  old 
man  or  any  of  his  devices. 

"His  theories  were  so  convincing,"  sighed  Flora. 

"And  you  felt  so  pitiful  for  him,"  prompted  Anna. 

"Grandma  did;  and  I  was  so  ambitious  to  do  some 
great  patriotic  service — like  yours,  you  Callenders,  in 
giving  those  cannon'! — and " 

"Oh,  but  you  went  too  far!" 

"Ah,  if  we  had  only  gone  no  farther!" 
|  "You  went  farther?    How  could  you?" 
<   "Grandma  did.     You  know,  dear,  how  suddenly 
Captain  Kincaid  had  to  leave  for  Mobile — by  night?" 

"Yes,"  murmured  Anna,  with  great  emphasis  in  her 
private  mind. 

88 


Flora  Romances 

"Well,  jus'  at  the  las'  he  gave  Charlie  a  small  bag  of 
gold,  hundreds  of  dollars,  for — for — me  to  keep  }or  him 
till  his  return.  Anna!  I  was  offended." 

"Oh,  but  surely  he  meant  no " 

"Ah,  my  dear,  did  I  ever  give  him  the  very  least 
right  to  pick  me  out  in  that  manner?  No.  Except  in 
that  one  pretty  way  he  has  with  all  of  us — and  which 
you  know  so  well " 

An  uncourageous  faint  smile  seemed  the  safest  re 
sponse. 

"Yes,"  said  Flora,  "you  know  it.  And  I  had  never 
allowed  myself " 

With  eyes  down  the  two  girls  sat  silent.  Then  the 
further  word  came  absently,  "I  refused  to  touch  his 
money,"  and  there  was  another  stillness. 

"Dear,"  slowly  said  Anna,  "I  don't  believe  it  was 
his.  It  would  not  have  been  in  gold.  Some  men  of  the 
battery  were  here  last  evening —  You  know  the  Aboli 
tion  school-mistress  who  was  sent  North  that  day?" 

"Yes,  I  know,  'twas  hers." 

"Well,  dear,  if  she  could  entrust  it  to  him " 

"Ah!  she  had  a  sort  of  right,  being,  as  the  whole 
battery  knows,  in  love  with  him" — the  beauty  swept  a 
finger  across  her  perfect  brows — "up  to  there!  For 
that  I  don't  know  is  he  to  blame.  If  a  girl  has  no  more 
sense " 

"No,"  murmured  Anna  as  the  cruel  shaft  went 
through  her.  "  What  did  Charlie  do  with  the  money  ?  " 

Flora  tossed  a  despairing  hand:  "Gave  it  to  grand 
ma!  And  poor  innocent  grandma  lent  it  to  the  old 
gentleman!  'Twas  to  do  wonders  for  the  powder  and 

gun,  and  be  return'  in  three  days.  But  the  next " 

89 


KincaicTs  Battery 

"I  see,"  sighed  Anna,  "I  see!" 

"Yes,  next  day  'twas  Sunday,  and  whiles  I  was 
kneeling  in  the  church  the  powder,  the  gun,  the  old  man 
and  the  money —  Oh,  Anna,  what  shall  I  do?" 

"My  dear,  I  will  tell  you,"  began  Anna,  but  the 
seeker  of  advice  was  not  quite  ready  for  it. 

"We  have  a  few  paltry  things,  of  course,"  she  spoke 
on,  "but  barely  would  they  pay  half.  They  would 
neither  save  our  honor,  neither  leave  us  anything  for 
rent  or  bread!  Our  house,  to  be  sure,  is  worth  more 
than  we  have  borrowed  on  it,  but  in  the  meantime " 

"In  the  meantime,  dear,  you  shall — "  But  still 
Flora  persisted: 

"Any  day,  any  hour,  Captain  Kincaid  may  return. 
Oh,  if  'twere  anybody  in  this  worP  but  him!  For, 
Anna,  I  must  take  all  the  blame — all!"  The  face  went 
again  into  the  hands. 

"My  dear,  you  shall  take  none.  You  shall  hand  him 
every  dollar,  every  picayune,  on  sight." 

"Ah,  how  is  that  possible?  Oh,  no,  no,  no.  Use 
your  money?  Never,  never,  never!" 

"  It  isn't  money,  Flora.  And  no  one  shall  ever  know. 
I've  got  some  old  family  jewellery " 

"Family —    Oh,  sweet,  for  shame!" 

"No  shame  whatever.  There's  a  great  lot  of  it — 
kinds  that  will  never  be  worn  again.  Let  me — "  The 
speaker  rose. 

"No,  no,  no!  No,  Anna,  no!  For  Heaven's 
sake " 

"Just  a  piece  or  two,"  insisted  Anna.  "Barely 
enough  to  borrow  the  amount."  She  backed  away, 
Flora  clinging  to  her  fingers  and  faltering: 

90 


Flora  Romances 

"No,  blessed  angel,  you  must  not!  No,  I  will  not 
wait.  I'll— I'll " 

But  Anna  kissed  the  clinging  hands  and  vanished. 

A  high  elation  bore  her  quite  to  her  room  and  re 
mained  with  her  until  she  had  unlocked  the  mass  of  old 
jewels  and  knelt  before  them.  But  then  all  at  once  it 
left  her.  She  laid  her  folded  hands  upon  them,  bent 
her  brow  to  the  hands,  then  lifted  brow  and  weeping 
eyes  and  whispered  to  Heaven  for  mercy. 

"Oh" — a  name  she  could  not  speak  even  there  went 
through  her  heart  in  two  big  throbs — "if  only  we  had 
never  met!  I  never  set  so  much  as  a  smile  to  snare 
you,  you  who  have  snared  me.  Can  Connie  be  right  ? 
Have  you  felt  my  thraldom,  and  are  you  trying  to  throw 
me  off  ?  Then  I  must  help  you  do  it.  Though  I  covet 
your  love  more  than  life  I  will  not  tether  it.  Oh,  it's 
because  I  so  covet  that  I  will  not  tether  it!  With  the 
last  gem  from  my  own  throat  will  I  rather  help  you  go 
free  if  you  want  to  go.  God  of  mercy,  what  else  can  I 
do!" 

In  grave  exultancy  Flora  moved  up  and  down  the 
drawing-room  enjoying  her  tread  on  its  rich  carpet. 
She  would  have  liked  to  flit  back  to  the  side  of  yonder 
great  chimney  breast,  the  spot  where  she  had  been 
surprised  while  sounding  the  panel  work,  but  this  was 
no  time  for  postponable  risks.  She  halted  to  regale 
her  critical  eye  on  the  goodly  needlework  of  a  folding- 
screen  whose  joints,  she  noticed,  could  not  be  peered 
through,  and  in  a  pretty,  bird-like  way  stole  a  glance 
behind  it.  Nothing  there.  She  stepped  to  a  front 
window  and  stood  toying  with  the  perfect  round  of  her 
silken  belt.  How  slimly  neat  it  was.  Yet  beneath  the 

91 


Kincaid's  Battery 

draperies  it  so  trimly  confined  lay  hid,  in  a  few  notes  of 
"city  money,"  the  proceeds  of  the  gold  she  had  just 
reported  blown  into  thin  air  with  the  old  inventor — 
who  had  never  seen  a  glimmer  of  it.  Not  quite  the  full 
amount  was  there;  it  had  been  sadly  nibbled.  But 
now  by  dear  Anna's  goodness  (ahem!)  the  shortage 
could  be  restored,  the  entire  hundreds  handed  back  to 
Captain  Kincaid,  and  a  snug  sum  be  retained  "for 
rent  and  bread."  Yet  after  all — as  long  as  good  stories 
came  easy — why  hand  anything  back — to  anybody — 
even  to — him? 

He!  In  her  heart  desire  and  odium  beat  strangely 
together.  Fine  as  martial  music  he  was,  yet  gallingly 
out  of  her  rhythm,  above  her  key.  Liked  her  much, 
too.  Yes,  for  charms  she  had;  any  fool  could  be  liked 
that  way.  What  she  craved  was  to  be  liked  for  charms 
she  had  not,  graces  she  scorned;  and  because  she  could 
not  be  sure  how  much  of  that  sort  she  was  winning  she 
tingled  with  heat  against  him — and  against  Anna — 
Anna  giver  of  guns — who  Jiad  the  money  to  give  guns — 
till  her  bosom  rose  and  fell.  But  suddenly  her  musing 
ceased,  her  eyes  shone. 

A  mounted  officer  galloped  into  the  driveway,  a 
private  soldier  followed,  and  the  private  was  her  brother. 
Now  they  came  close.  The  leader  dismounted,  passed 
his  rein  to  Charlie  and  sprang  up  the  verandi  steps. 
Flora  shrank  softly  from  the  window  and  at  the  same 
moment  Anna  reentered  gayly,  showing  a  glitter  of 
values  twice  all  expectation: 

"If  these  are  not  enough — "  She  halted  with  lips 
apart.  Flora  had  made  sign  toward  the  front  door, 
and  now  with  a  moan  of  fond  protest  covered  the 

92 


Flora  Romances 

gem-laden  hand  in  both  her  palms  and  pushed  it  from 
her. 

"Take  them  back,"  she  whispered,  yet  held  it  fast, 
"'tis  too  late!  There— the  door-bell!  'Tis  Hilary 
Kincaid!  All  is  too  late,  take  them  back!" 

"Take  them,  you!"  as  vehemently  whispered  Anna. 
"You  must  take  them!  You  must,  you  shall!" 

Flora  had  half  started  to  fly,  but  while  she  hung  upon 
Anna's  words  she  let  her  palms  slip  under  the  bestow 
ing  hand  and  the  treasure  slide  into  her  own  fingers. 

"Too  late,  too  late!  And  oh,  I  can  never,  never  use 
them  any'ow!"  She  sprang  noiselessly  aside.  To  a 
maid  who  came  down  the  hall  Anna  quietly  motioned 
to  show  the  newcomer  into  an  opposite  room,  but  Flora 
saw  that  the  sign  was  misinterpreted:  "She  didn't 
understan' !  Anna,  she's  going  to  bring  him!"  Before 
the  words  were  done  the  speaker's  lithe  form  was  gliding 
down  the  room  toward  the  door  by  which  the  other  ladies 
had  gone  out,  but  as  she  reached  it  she  turned  with  a 
hand-toss  as  of  some  despairing  afterthought  and 
flitted  back. 

Out  in  the  hall  the  front  door  opened  and  closed  and 
a  sabre  clinked:  "Is  Miss  Callender  at  home?" 

Before  the  question  was  half  put  its  unsuspected 
hearers  had  recovered  a  faultless  poise.  Beside  a 
table  that  bore  her  roses  she  whom  the  inquirer  sought 
stood  retouching  them  and  reflecting  a  faint  excess  of 
their  tint,  while  Flora,  in  a  grave  joy  of  the  theatrical, 
equal  to  her  companion's  distress  of  it,  floated  from 
view  behind  the  silken  screen. 


93 


Kincaid's  Battery 
XX 

THE   FIGHT    FOR    THE   STANDARD 

His  red  kepi  in  hand  and  with  all  the  stalwart  brisk 
ness  of  the  flag-presentation's  day  and  hour  Hilary 
Kincaid  .stepped  into  the  room  and  halted,  as  large- 
eyed  as  on  that  earlier  occasion,  and  even  more  startled, 
before  the  small  figure  of  Anna. 

Yet  not  the  very  same  Hilary  Kincaid.  So  said  her 
heart  the  instant  glance  met  glance.  The  tarnish  of 
hard  use  was  on  all  his  trappings;  like  sea-marshes  on 
fire  he  was  reddened  and  browned;  about  him  hung 
palpably  the  sunshine  and  air  of  sands  and  waves,  and 
all  the  stress  and  swing  of  wide  designs;  and  on  brow 
and  cheek  were  new  lines  that  looked  old.  From  every 
point  of  his  aspect  the  truth  rushed  home  to  her  live 
lier,  deadlier  than  ever  hitherto,  that  there  was  War, 
and  that  he  and  she  were  already  parts  of  it. 

But  the  change  was  more  than  this.  A  second  and 
quieter  look,  the  hand-grasp  lingering,  showed  some 
thing  deeper;  something  that  wove  and  tangled  itself 
through  and  about  all  designs,  toils,  and  vigils,  and 
suddenly  looking  out  of  his  eyes  like  a  starved  captive, 
cried,  "you — you — "  and  prophesied  that,  whether 
they  would  or  not,  this  war  was  to  be  his  and  hers  to 
gether.  A  responding  thrill  must  have  run  from  her 
fingers  into  his  and  belied  the  unaccountable  restraint 
of  her  welcome,  for  a  joy  shone  from  him  which  it  took 
her  ignoring  smile  and  her  hand's  withdrawal  to 
quench. 

"Miss  Anna " 

94 


The  Fight  for  the  Standard 

They  sat  down.  His  earlier  boyishness  came  again 
somewhat,  but  only  somewhat,  as  he  dropped  his 
elbows  to  his  knees,  looking  now  into  his  cap  and  now 
into  her  face.  A  glance  behind  her  had  assured  Anna 
that  there  was  no  shadow  on  the  screen,  behind  which 
sat  Flora  on  the  carpet,  at  graceful  ease  listening  while 
she  eagerly  appraised  the  jewels  in  her  hands  and  lap. 

"Miss  Anna,"  said  the  soldier  again,  "I've  come — 
I've  come  to  tell  you  something.  It's  mighty  hard  to 
tell.  It's  harder  than  I  thought  it  would  be.  For, 
honestly,  Miss  Anna,  you — from  the  first  time  I  ever 
saw  you,  you — you —  Were  you  going  to  speak?" 

Behind  the  screen  Flora  smiled  malignly  while  Anna 
said,  "No,  I — I  was  only — no,  not  at  all;  go  on." 

"Yes,  Miss  Anna,  from  the  first  time  I " 

"When  did  you  get  back  from  Mobile?"  asked  Anna 
seeing  he  must  be  headed  off. 

"From  Mobile?  Just  now,  almost.  You  don't 
sup " 

"Oh!  I  hope" — she  must  head  him  off  again — "I 
hope  you  bring  good  news?"  There  was  risk  in  the 
question,  but  where  was  there  safety?  At  her  back 
the  concealed  listener  waited  keenly  for  the  reply. 

"Yes,"  said  Hilary,  "news  the  very  best  and  hardly 
an  hour  old.  Didn't  you  hear  the  battery  cheering? 
That's  what  I've  come  to  tell  you.  Though  it's  hard 
to  tell,  for  I " 

"It's  from  Mobile,  you  say?" 

"No,  I  can  tell  you  the  Mobile  news  first,  but  it's 
bad.  Miss  Flora's  home " 

Anna  gave  a  start  and  with  a  hand  half  upthrown  said 
quietly,  "Don't  tell  me.  No,  please,  don't,  I  don't 

95 


Kincaid's  Battery 

want  to  hear  it.  I  can't  explain,  but  I — I — "  Tears 
wet  her  lashes,  and  her  hands  strove  with  each  other. 
"I  don't  like  bad  news.  You  should  have  taken  it 
straight  to  Flora.  Oh,  I  wish  you'd  do  that  now,  won't 
you — please?" 

Behind  the  screen  the  hidden  one  stiffened  where 
she  crouched  with  fierce  brow  and  fixed  eyes. 

Kincaid  spoke:  "Would  you  have  me  pass  you  by 
with  my  good  news  to  go  first  to  her  with  the  bad?" 

"Oh,  Captain  Kincaid,  yes,  yes!  Do  it  yet.  Go, 
do  it  now.  And  tell  her  the  good  news  too!" 

"Tell  her  the  good  first  and  then  stab  her  with  the 
bad?" 

"Oh,  tell  her  the  bad  first.  Do  her  that  honor. 
She  has  earned  it.  She'll  bear  the  worst  like  the  heroine 
she  is — the  heroine  and  patriot.  She's  bearing  it  so 
now!" 

"What!  she  knows  already?" 

In  her  hiding  Flora's  intent  face  faintly  smiled  a 
malevolence  that  would  have  startled  even  the  grandam 
who  still  killed  time  out  among  the  roses  with  her 
juniors. 

"Yes,"  replied  Anna,  "she  knows  already." 

"Knows!  Miss  Anna — that  her  home  is  in  ashes?" 

Anna  gave  a  wilder  start :  "  Oh,  no-o-oh !  Oh,  yes — 
oh,  no — oh,  yes,  yes !  Oh,  Captain  Kincaid,  how  could 
you?  Oh,  monstrous,  monstrous!"  She  made  all 
possible  commotion  to  hide  any  sound  that  might 
betray  Flora,  who  had  sprung  to  her  feet,  panting. 

"But,  but,  Miss  Anna!"  protested  Hilary.  "Why, 
Miss  Anna " 

"Oh,  Captain  Kincaid,  how  could  you?" 


The  Fight  for  the  Standard 

"Why,  you  don't  for  a  moment  imagine ?" 

"  Oh,  it's  done,  it's  done !  Go,  tell  her.  Go  at  once, 
Captain  Kincaid.  Please  go  at  once,  won't  you  ?  .  .  . 
Please!" 

He  had  risen  amazed.  Whence  such  sudden  horror, 
in  this  fair  girl,  of  a  thing  known  by  her  already  before 
he  came?  And  what  was  this  beside?  Horror  in  the 
voice  yet  love  beaming  from  the  eyes?  He  was  torn 
with  perplexity.  "I'll  go,  of  course,"  he  said  as  if  in 
a  dream.  "Of  course  I'll  go  at  once,  but — why — if 
Miss  Flora  already — ?"  Then  suddenly  he  recovered 
himself  in  the  way  Anna  knew  so  well.  "Miss  Anna" 
— he  gestured  with  his  cap,  his  eyes  kindling  with  a 
strange  mixture  of  worship  and  drollery  though  his 
brow  grew  darker — "I'm  gone  now!" 

"In  mercy,  please  go!" 

"I'm  gone,  Miss  Anna,  I'm  truly  gone.  I  always  am 
when  I'm  with  you.  Fred  said  it  would  be  so.  You 
scare  the  nonsense  out  of  me,  and  when  that  goes  I  go 
— the  bubble  bursts!  Miss  Anna — oh,  hear  me — it's 
my  last  chance — I'll  vanish  in  a  moment.  The  fellows 
tell  me  I  always  know  just  what  to  say  to  any  lady  or 
to  anything  a  lady  says;  but,  on  my  soul,  I  don't  think 
I've  ever  once  known  what  to  say  to  you  or  to  anything 
you've  ever  said  to  me,  and  I  don't  know  now,  except 
that  I  must  and  will  tell  you " 

"That  you  did  not  order  the  torch  set!  Oh,  say 
that!" 

"No  one  ordered  it.  It  was  a  senseless  mistake. 
Some  private  soldiers  who  knew  that  my  lines  of  sur 
vey  passed  through  the  house " 

"Ah-h!  ah-h!" 

97 


Kincaid's  Battery 

"Miss  Anna,  what  would  you  have?  Such  is  war! 
Many's  the  Southern  home  must  go  down  under  the 
fire  of — of  Kincaid's  Battery,  Miss  Anna,  before  this 
war  is  over,  else  we  might  as  well  bring  you  back  your 
flag  and  guns.  Shall  we  ?  We  can't  now,  they're  or 
dered  to  the  front.  There!  I've  got  it  out!  That's 
my  good  news.  Bad  enough  for  mothers  and  sisters. 
Bad  for  the  sister  of  Charlie  Valcour.  Good  for  you. 
So  good  and  bad  in  one  for  me,  and  so  hard  to  tell  and 
say  no  more!  Don't  you  know  why?" 

"Oh,  I've  no  right  to  know — and  you've  no  right — 
oh,  indeed,  you  mustn't.  It  would  be  so  unfair — to 
you.  I  can't  tell  you  why,  but  it — it  would  be  I" 

"And  it  wouldn't  be  of ?" 

"Any  use?    No,  no!" 

Torturing  mystery!  that  with  such  words  of  doom 
she  should  yet  blush  piteously,  beam  passionately. 

"Good-by,  then.  I  go.  But  I  go — under  your  flag, 
don't  I?  Under  your  flag!  captain  of  your  guns!" 

"Ah — one  word — wait!  Oh,  Captain  Kincaid,  right 
is  right!  Not  half  those  guns  are  mine.  That  flag  is 
not  mine." 

There  was  no  quick  reply.  From  her  concealment 
Flora,  sinking  noiselessly  again  to  the  carpet,  harkened 
without  avail.  The  soldier — so  newly  and  poignantly 
hurt  that  twice  when  he  took  breath  he  failed  to  speak 
— gazed  on  the  disclaiming  girl  until  forgery  distress 
she  broke  the  silence:  "I — you — every  flag  of  our 
cause — wherever  our  brave  soldiers " 

"Oh,  but  Kincaid's  Battery! — and  that  flag,  Anna 
Callender!  The  flag  you  gave  us!  That  sacred  ban 
ner  starts  for  Virginia  to-morrow — goes  into  the  war, 

98 


The  Fight  for  the  Standard 

it  and  your  guns,  with  only  this  poor  beggar  and  his 
boys  to  win  it  honor  and  glory.  Will  you  deny  us 
— who  had  it  from  your  hands — your  leave  to  call 
it  yours?  Oh,  no,  no!  To  me — to  me  you  will 
not!" 

For  reply  there  came  a  light  in  Anna's  face  that  shone 
into  his  heart  and  was  meant  so  to  shine,  yet  her  dis 
sent  was  prompt:  "I  must.  I  must.  Oh,  Capt — 
Captain  Kincaid,  I  love  that  flag  too  well  to  let  it  go 
misnamed.  It's  the  flag  of  all  of  us  who  made  it,  us 
hundred  girls " 

"Hundred — yes,  yes,  true.  But  how?  This  very 
morning  I  chanced  upon  your  secret — through  little  Vic- 
torine — that  every  stitch  in  all  that  flag's  embroideries 
is  yours." 

"Yet,  Captain  Kincaid,  it  is  the  flag  of  all  those  hun 
dred  girls;  and  if  to  any  one  marching  under  it  it  is  to 
be  the  flag  of  any  one  of  us  singly,  that  one  can  only  be 
— you  know!" 

Majestically  in  her  hiding-place  the  one  implied 
lowered  and  lifted  her  head  in  frigid  scorn  and  awaited 
the  commander's  answer. 

"True  again,"  he  said,  "true.  Let  the  flag  of  my 
hundred  boys  be  to  all  and  each  the  flag  of  a  hundred 
girls.  Yet  will  it  be  also  the  flag  of  his  heart's  one  choice 
— sister,  wife,  or  sweetheart — to  every  man  marching, 
fighting,  or  dying  under  it — and  more  are  going  to  die 
under  it  than  are  ever  coming  back.  To  me,  oh,  to  me, 
let  it  be  yours.  My  tasks  have  spared  me  no  time  to 
earn  of  you  what  would  be  dearer  than  life,  and  all  one 
with  duty  and  honor.  May  I  touch  your  hand  ?  Oh, 
just  to  say  good-by.  But  if  ever  I  return — no,  have  no 

99 


KincaicTs  Battery 

fear,  I'll  not  say  it  now.  Only — only — "  he  lifted  the 
hand  to  his  lips — "good-by.  God's  smile  be  on  you  in 
all  that  is  to  come." 

"Good-by,"  came  her  answering  murmur. 

"And  the  flag?"  he  exclaimed.  "The  flag?"  By 
the  clink  of  his  sabre  Flora  knew  he  was  backing  away. 
"Tell  me — me  alone — the  word  to  perish  with  me  if  I 
perish — that  to  me  as  if  alone" — the  clinking  came 
nearer  again — "to  me  and  for  me  and  with  your  bless 
ing" — again  the  sound  drew  away — "the  flag — the 
flag  I  must  court  death  under — is  yours." 

Silence.  From  out  in  the  hall  the  lover  sent  back  a 
last  beseeching  look,  but  no  sound  reached  the  hiding 
of  the  tense  listener  whose  own  heart's  beating  threat 
ened  to  reveal  her;  no  sound  to  say  that  now  Anna 
had  distressfully  shaken  her  head,  or  that  now  her 
tears  ran  down,  or  that  now  in  a  mingled  pain  and 
rapture  of  confession  she  nodded — nodded !  and  yet  im 
ploringly  waved  him  away. 

It  was  easy  to  hear  the  door  open  and  close.  Faintly 
on  this  other  hand  the  voices  of  the  ladies  returning 
from  the  garden  foreran  them.  The  soldier's  tread 
was  on  the  outer  stair.  Now  theirs  was  in  the  rear 
veranda.  With  it  tinkled  their  laughter.  Out  yonder 
hoofs  galloped. 

The  hidden  one  stole  forth.  A  book  on  a  table  was 
totally  engaging  the  eyes  of  her  hostess  and  at  the  in 
stant  grandma  reentered  laden  with  roses.  Now  all 
five  were  in,  and  Anna,  pouring  out  words  with  every 
motion,  and  curiously  eyed  by  Constance,  took  the 
flowers  to  give  them  a  handier  form,  while  Flora  rallied 
her  kinswoman  on  wasting  their  friends'  morning  these 

100 


Constance  Cross-Examines 

busy  times,  and  no  one  inquired,  and  no  one  told,  who 
had  been  here  that  now  had  vanished. 


XXI 

CONSTANCE    CROSS-EXAMINES 

IT  was  like  turning  to  the  light  the  several  facets  of 
one  of  those  old-fashioned  jewels  Flora  was  privately 
bearing  away,  to  see  the  five  beauties  part  company: 
"Good-by,  good-by,"  kiss,  kiss — ah,  the  sad  waste  of 
it!— kiss  left,  kiss  right,  "good-by." 

As  the  Callenders  came  in  again  from  the  veranda, 
their  theme  was  Flora.  "Yet  who,"  asked  Constance, 
"ever  heard  her  utter  a  moral  sentiment?" 

"Oh,  her  beauty  does  that,"  rejoined  the  kindly 
Miranda.  "As  Captain  Kincaid  said  that  evening 
he " 

"Yes,  I  know.  He  said  he  would  pass  her  into 
heaven  on  her  face,  and  I  think  it  was  a  very  strange 
thing  for  him  to  say!" 

"Why?"  daringly  asked  Miranda — and  ran  from  the 
room. 

The  hater  of  whys  turned  upon  her  sister:  "Nan, 
what's  the  matter?  .  .  .  Oh,  now,  yes,  there  is. 
What  made  you  start  when  Miranda  mentioned —  Yes, 
you  did.  You're  excited,  you  know  you  are.  When 
we  came  in  from  the  garden  you  and  Flora  were 
both " 

"Now,  Connie " 

"Pshaw,  Nan,  I  know  he's  been  here,  it's  in  your 
face.  Who  was  with  him;  Charlie?" 

101 


KincaicTs  Battery 

"Yes.  They  just  dropped  in  to  say  good-by.  The 
battery's  ordered  to  Virginia.  Virginia  hasn't  seceded 
yet,  but  he  feels  sure  she  will  before  they  can  get  there, 
and  so  do  I.  Don't  you  ?  If  Kentucky  and  Maryland 
would  only " 

"Now,  Nan,  just  hush.     When  does  he  go?" 

"To-morrow.  But  as  to  us" — the  girl  shrugged 
prettily  while  caressing  her  roses — "he's  gone  now," 

"How  did  he  talk?" 

"Oh — quite  as  usual."  The  head  bent  low  into  the 
flowers.  "In  the  one  pretty  way  he  has  with  all  of  us, 
you  know." 

Constance  would  not  speak  until  their  eyes  met  again. 
Then  she  asked,  "Did  Charlie  and  Flora  give  him  any 
chance — to  express  himself?" 

"Oh,  Con,  don't  be  foolish.  He  didn't  want  any. 
He  as  much  as  said  so!" 

"Ye-es,"  drawled  the  bride  incredulously,  "but " 

"Oh,  he  really  did  not,  Con.  He  talked  of  nothing 
but  the  battery  flag  and  how,  because  I'd  presented  it, 
they  would  forever  and  ever  and  ever  and  ever — "  She 
waved  her  hands  sarcastically. 

"Nan,  behave.  Come  here."  The  pair  took  the 
sofa.  "How  did  he  look  and  act  when  he  first  came 
in?  Before  you  froze  him  stiff?" 

"I  didn't  freeze  him."  The  quiet,  hurt  denial  was 
tremulous.  "Wood  doesn't  freeze."  The  mouth 
drooped  satirically:  "You  know  well  enough  that  the 
man  who  says  his  tasks  have  spared  him  no  time  to — 

"Nan,  honest!  Did  you  give  him  a  fair  chance — the 
kind  I  gave  Steve?" 

102 


Constance  Cross-Examines 

"Oh,  Con!  He  had  all  the  chance  any  man  ever 
got,  or  will  get,  from  me." 

The  sister  sighed:  "Nan  Callender,  you  are  the 
poorest  fisherman " 

"  I'm  not !  I'm  none !  And  if  I  were  one  " — the  dis- 
claimant  glistened  with  mirth — "I  couldn't  be  as  poor 
a  one  as  he  is;  he's  afraid  of  his  own  bait."  She  began 
to  laugh  but  had  to  force  back  her  tears:  "I  didn't 
mean  that!  He's  never  had  any  bait — for  me,  nor 
wanted  any.  Neither  he  nor  I  ever —  Really,  Con, 
you  are  the  only  one  who's  made  any  mistake  as  to 
either  of  us!  You  seem  to  think " 

"  Oh,  dearie,  I  don't  think  at  all,  I  just  know.    I  know 

he's  furiously  in  love  with  you Yes,  furiously;  but 

that  he's  determined  to  be  fair  to  Fred  Greenleaf " 

"Oh!" — a  yet  wickeder  smile. 

"Yes,  and  that  he  feels  poor.  You  know  that  if  the 
General " 

The  hearer  lifted  and  dropped  both  arms:  "Oh! — 
to  be  continued!" 

"Well,  I  know,  too,  that  he  doesn't  believe,  anyhow, 
in  soldiers  marrying.  I've  never  told  you,  sweet,  but — 
if  I  hadn't  cried  so  hard — Steve  would  have  challenged 
Hilary  Kincaid  for  what  he  said  on  that  subject  the 
night  we  were  married!" 

Anna  straightened,  flashed,  and  then  dropped  again 
as  she  asked,  "Is  that  all  you  know?" 

"No,  I  know  what  counts  for  more  than  all  the  rest; 
I  know  you're  a  terror  to  him." 

Remotely  in  the  terror's  sad  eyes  glimmered  a  smile 
that  was  more  than  half  satisfaction.  "You  might  as 
well  call  him  a  coward,"  she  murmured. 

103 


Kincaid's  Battery 

"  Not  at  all.  You  know  you've  been  a  terror  to  every 
suitor  you've  ever  had — except  Fred  Greenleaf;  he's 
the  only  one  you  couldn't  keep  frightened  out  of  his  wits. 
Now  this  time  I  know  it's  only  because  you're — you're 
bothered!  You  don't  know  how  you're  going  to 
feel " 

"Now,  Con " 

"And  you  don't  want  to  mislead  him,  and  you're 
just  bothered  to  death !  It  was  the  same  way  with  me." 

"It  wasn't!"  silently  said  Anna's  lips,  her  face 
averted.  Suddenly  she  turned  and  clutched  her  sister's 
hands:  "Oh,  Con,  while  we  talk  trifles  Flora's  home 
lies  in  ashes!  .  .  .  Yes,  he  told  me  so  just  now." 

"Didn't  he  tell  her  too?" 

"Why,  no,  Connie,  he — he  couldn't  very  well.  It — 
it  would  have  been  almost  indelicate,  wouldn't  it  ?  But 
he's  gone  now  to  tell  her." 

"He  needn't,"  said  Constance.  "She  knows  it  now. 
The  moment  I  came  in  here  I  saw,  through  all  her  light 
ness,  she'd  got  some  heavy  news.  She  must  have  over 
heard  him,  Nan." 

"Connie,  I— I  believe  she  did!" 

"  Well,  that's  all  right.    What  are  you  blushing  for  ?  " 

" Blushing!  Every  time  I  get  a  little  warm — "  The 
speaker  rose  to  go,  but  the  sister  kept  her  hand : 

"  Keep  fresh  for  this  evening,  honey.    He'll  be  back." 

"No,  he  won't.  He  doesn't  propose  to  if  he  could 
and  he  couldn't  if  he  did.  To  get  the  battery  off  to 
morrow " 

"It  won't  get  off  to-morrow,  nor  the  next  day,  nor 
the  next.  You  know  how  it  always  is.  When  Steve — " 

"Oh,  I  don't  know  anything,"  said  Anna,  pulling 
104 


Same  Story  Slightly  Warped 

free  and  moving  off.     "But  you,  oh,  you  know  it  all, 
you  and  Steve!" 

But  the  elder  beauty  was  right.  The  battery  did  not 
go  for  more  than  a  fortnight,  and  Hilary  came  again 
that  evening.  Sitting  together  alone,  he  and  Anna 
talked  about  their  inner  selves — that  good  old  sign! 
and  when  she  gave  him  a  chance  he  told  her  what 
Greenleaf  had  said  about  her  and  the  ocean.  Also  he 
confided  to  her  his  envy  of  small-statured  people,  and 
told  how  it  hurt  him  to  go  about  showing  the  bigness 
of  his  body  and  hiding  the  pettiness  of  his  soul.  And 
he  came  the  next  evening  and  the  next,  and  the  next, 
and  the  next,  and  the  next. 


XXII 

SAME    STORY    SLIGHTLY    WARPED 

NOT  literally.  That  evening,  yes,  an  end  of  it,  but 
not  the  very  next  four,  did  Kincaid  spend  with  Anna. 
It  merely  looked  so  to  Flora  Valcour. 

Even  on  that  first  day,  after  his  too  prompt  forenoon 
gallop  from  Callender  House  to  the  Valcour  apartment 
had,  of  course,  only  insured  his  finding  Flora  not  at 
home,  all  its  evening  except  the  very  end  was  passed 
with  her,  Flora,  in  her  open  balcony  overlooking  the 
old  Place  d'Armes.  His  head  ringing  with  a  swarm  of 
things  still  to  be  done  and  ordered  done,  he  had  pur 
posed  to  remain  only  long  enough  to  tell  his  dire  news 
manfully,  accept  without  insistent  debate  whatever 
odium  it  might  entail,  and  decently  leave  its  gentle 
recipients  to  their  grief  and  dismay.  What  steps  they 


Kincaid's  Battery 

should  take  to  secure  compensation  it  were  far  better 
they  should  discuss  with  Adolphe,  who  would  be  here  to 
aid  them  when  he,  Kincaid,  would  be  in  far  Virginia. 
The  only  other  imperative  matter  was  that  of  the  young 
schoolma'am's  gold,  which  must  be  left  in  bank. 
Awkward  business,  to  have  to  ask  for  it  in  scrambling 
haste  at  such  a  moment. 

But  on  a  starlit  balcony  with  two  such  ladies  as  the 
Valcours,  to  do  one's  errands,  such  errands,  in  scram 
bling  haste  proved  not  even  a  military  possibility. 
Their  greeting  inquiries  had  to  be  answered: 

"Yes,  Charlie  was  well.  He  would  be  along  soon, 
with  fresh  messages  from  division  headquarters.  The 
battery  was  at  last — Pardon?  .  .  .  Yes,  the  Callen- 
ders  were  well — he  supposed!  He  had  seen  only  Miss 
Anna,  and  her  only  for  so  brief  an  instant " 

No,  Madame  Valcour  had  merely  cleared  her  throat. 
"That  climate  is  hard  on  those  throat'." 

He  had  seen  Miss  Anna,  he  resumed,  "for  so  brief 
an  instant — on  an  errand — that  he  had  not  made  civil 
inquiry  after  the  others,  but  had  left  good-by  for  them 
about  as  a  news-carrier  wads  and  throws  in  the  morning 
paper!" 

It  was  so  pretty,  the  silvery  way  the  questioning  pair 
laughed  to  each  other — at  his  simile,  if  that  was  the 
genuine  source  of  their  amusement — that  he  let  himself 
laugh  with  them. 

"  But  how  ?  "  they  further  asked.  "  He  had  left  good- 
by?  Good-day,  yes!  But  for  what  good-by  when  juz' 
returning?" 

"Ah,  because  here  to  them,  also,  it  must  be  good-by, 
and  be  as  brief  as  there!  The  battery — he  had  sent 

1 06 


Same  Story  Slightly  Warped 

word  to  them  at  sunrise,  but  had  just  learned  that  his 
messenger  had  missed  them — the  battery  was  at  last 
ordered" — etc. 

"Mon  Dieu!"  gasped  the  old  lady  as  if  this  was  too 
cruelly  sudden,  and,  "Oh,  my  brother!  Oh,  Captain 
Kincaid!"  beautifully  sighed  Flora,  from  whom  the 
grandmother  had  heard  the  news  hours  before. 

Yet,  "Of  course  any  time  'twould  have  to  be  sud 
den,"  they  had  presently  so  recovered  as  to  say,  and 
Flora,  for  both,  spoke  on  in  accents  of  loveliest  renun 
ciation.  She  easily  got  the  promise  she  craved,  that 
no  ill  should  come  to  Charlie  which  a  commander's 
care  could  avert. 

The  loss  of  their  Mobile  home,  which  also  Madame 
had  perfectly  known  since  morning,  was  broken  to  them 
with  less  infelicity,  though  they  would  talk  cheerily  of 
the  house  as  something  which  no  evil  ever  would  or 
could  befall,  until  suddenly  the  girl  said,  "Grandma, 
dearest,  that  night  air  is  not  so  pretty  good  for  your 
rheum;  we  better  pass  inside,"  and  the  old  lady,  in 
sistently  unselfish,  moved  a  step  within,  leaving  the 
other  two  on  the  balcony.  There,  when  the  blow  came 
at  last,  Flora's  melodious  grievings  were  soon  over,  and 
her  sweet  reasonableness,  her  tender  exculpation  not 
alone  of  this  dear  friend  but  even  of  the  silly  fellows 
who  had  done  the  deed,  and  her  queenly,  patriotic  self- 
obliteration,  were  more  admirable  than  can  be  de 
scribed.  Were,  as  one  may  say,  good  literature.  The 
grateful  soldier  felt  shamed  to  find,  most  unaccountably, 
that  Anna's  positively  cruel  reception  of  the  same  news 
somehow  suited  him  better.  It  was  nearer  his  own 
size,  he  said  to  himself. 

107 


KincaicTs  Battery 

At  any  rate  the  foremost  need  now,  on  every  account, 
was  to  be  gone.  But  as  he  rose  Flora  reminded  him 
of  " those  few  hundred  gold?"  Goodness!  he  had 
clean  forgotten  the  thing.  He  apologized  for  the  lib 
erty  taken  in  leaving  it  with  her,  but —  "Oh!"  she 
prettily  interrupted,  "when  I  was  made  so  proud!" 

Well,  now  he  would  relieve  her  and  take  it  at  once  to 
a  bank  cashier  who  had  consented  to  receive  it  at  his 
house  this  very  night.  She  assured  him  its  custody  had 
given  her  no  anxiety,  for  she  had  promptly  passed  it 
over  to  another !  He  was  privately  amazed : . 

"Oh — o-oh — oh,  yes,  certainly.  That  was  right!  To 
whom  had  she ?" 

She  did  not  say.  "Yes,"  she  continued,  "she  had 
at  once  thought  it  ought  to  be  with  some  one  who  could 
easily  replace  it  if,  by  any  strange  mishap — flood,  fire, 
robbery — it  should  get  lost.  To  do  which  would  to 
her  be  impossible  if  at  Mobile  her  house — "  she  tossed 
out  her  hands  and  dropped  them  pathetically.  "But 
I  little  thought,  Captain  Kincaid — "  she  began  a  heart 
broken  gesture 

"Now,  Miss  Flora!"  the  soldier  laughingly  broke 
out,  "if  it's  lost  it's  lost  and  no  one  but  me  shall  lose  a 
cent  for  it!" 

"Ah,  that,"  cried  the  girl,  with  tears  in  her  voice, 
"'tis  impossible!  'Twould  kill  her,  that  mortification, 
as  well  as  me,  for  you  to  be  the  loser!" 

' ' Loser !  mortification ! ' '  laughed  Hilary.  "And  what 
should  I  do  with  my  mortification  if  I  should  let  you, 
or  her,  be  the  loser?  Who  is  she,  Miss  Flora?  If  I 
minded  the  thing,  you  understand,  I  shouldn't  ask." 

Flora  shrank  as  with  pain:  "Ah,  you  must  not! 
108 


Same  Story  Slightly  Warped 

And  you  must  not  guess,  for  you  will  surely  guess 
wrong!"  Nevertheless  she  saw  with  joy  that  he  had 
guessed  Anna,  yet  she  suffered  chagrin  to  see  also  that 
the  guess  made  him  glad.  "And  this  you  must  make 
me  the  promise;  that  you  never,  never  will  let  anybody 
know  you  have  discover'  that,  eh?" 

"Oh,  I  promise." 

"And  you  must  let  her  pay  it  me  back — that  money — 
and  me  pay  it  you.  'Twill  be  easy,  only  she  mus'  have 
time  to  get  the  money,  and  without  needing  to  tell  any 
body  for  why,  and  for  why  in  gold.  Alas!  I  could  have 
kept  that  a  secret  had  it  not  have  been  you  are  to  go 
to-morrow  morning  " 

"Oh,  rest  easy,"  said  the  cheerful  soldier,  "mum's 
the  word.  But,  Miss  Flora,  tell  me  this:  How  on  earth 
did  she  lose  it?" 

"Captain  Kincaid,  by  the  goodness  of  the  heart!" 

"But  how  did  it  go;  was  it ?" 

"Blown  up!  Blown  up  with  that  poor  old  man  in 
the  powder-mill!  Ah,  what  do  we  know  about  money, 
Captain  Kincaid,  we  silly  women?  That  poor,  inno 
cent  child,  she  lent  it  to  the  old  gentleman.  His  theories 
they  were  so  convincing,  and  she,  she  was  so  ambitious 
to  do  a  great  patriotic  service.  'Twas  to  make  wonders 
for  the  powder  and  gun,  and  to  be  return'  in  three  days. 
But  that  next  day  'twas  Sunday,  and  whiles  I  was 
kneeling  in  the  church  the  powder,  the  gun,  the  old  man 
and  the  money " 

Hilary  gestured  facetiously  for  the  narrator:  "That's 
how  millions  have  got  to  go  in  this  business,  and  this 
driblet — why,  I  might  have  lent  it,  myself,  if  I'd  been 

here!    No,  I'm  the  only  loser,  and " 

109 


Kincaid's  Battery 

"Ah,  Captain  Kincaid,  no,  no!  I  implore  you,  no! 
— and  for  her  sake!  Oh,  what  are  those  few  hundred 
for  her  to  lose,  if  so  she  can  only  wipe  that  mistake  ? 
No,  they  shall  be  in  the  charge  of  that  cashier  before 
you're  at  Virginia,  and  that  shall  be  my  first  news 
written  to  my  brother — though  he'll  not  comprehend 
except  that  he  is  to  tell  it  you." 

So  it  was  arranged  and  agreed.  As  again  he  moved 
to  go  she  won  a  new  pledge  of  unending  secrecy,  and 
Charlie  came  with  a  document.  Beside  the  parlor 
lamp,  where,  with  one  tiny  foot  covertly  unslippered  for 
the  easement  of  angry  corns,  Madame  sat  embroidering, 
Kincaid  broke  the  seal  and  read.  He  forced  a  scowl, 
but  through  it  glimmered  a  joy  in  which  Flora  discerned 
again  the  thought  of  Anna.  "Charlie,"  he  said  as  a 
smile  broke  through,  "prepare  yourself." 

"Now,  Captain,  if  those  old  imbeciles " 

The  commander's  smile  broadened:  "Our  battery, 
ladies  and  gentlemen,  can't  go  for  a  week." 

All  laughed  but  Charlie.  He  swore  at  the  top  of  his 
voice  and  threw  himself  from  the  room. 

When  his  Captain  had  followed,  Flora,  standing  and 
smiling,  drew  from  her  bosom  a  small,  well-filled  jewel- 
bag,  balanced  it  on  her  uplifted  palm  and,  rising  to  her 
toes,  sang,  "At  last,  at  last,  grace  au  del,  money  is 
easy!" 

"Yet  at  the  same  time  my  gifted  granddaughter," 
remarked  the  old  lady,  in  her  native  tongue  and  intent 
on  her  embroidery,  "is  uneasy,  eh?" 

Flora  ignored  the  comment.  She  laid  a  second  palm 
on  the  upraised  booty,  made  one  whole  revolution,  her 
soft  crinoline  ballooning  and  subsiding  with  a  seductive 

no 


Same  Story  Slightly  Warped 

swish  as  she  paused:  "And  you  shall  share  these  bless 
ings,  grannie,  love,  although  of  the  assets  themselves" 
— she  returned  the  bag  to  its  sanctuary  and  smoothed 
the  waist  where  the  paper  proceeds  of  the  school 
mistress's  gold  still  hid — "you  shall  never  handle  a 
dime."  She  sparkled  airily. 

"No?"  said  Madame,  still  moving  the  needle  and 
still  in  French.  "Nevertheless,  morning  and  evening 
together,  our  winnings  are — how  much?" 

"Ours?"  melodiously  asked  the  smiling  girl,  "they 
are  not  ours,  they  are  mine.  And  they  are — at  the 
least" — she  dropped  to  her  senior's  footstool  and  spoke 
caressingly  low — "a  clean  thousand!  Is  not  that  sweet 
enough  music  to  the  ear  of  a  venerable" — she  whis 
pered — "cormorant?"  She  sparkled  anew. 

"I  am  sorry,"  came  the  mild  reply,  "you  are  in  such 
torture  you  have  to  call  me  names.  But  it  is,  of  course, 
entirely  concerning — the  house — ahem!" 

Flora  rose,  walked  to  a  window,  and,  as  she  gazed 
out  across  the  old  plaza,  said  measuredly  in  a  hard 
voice:  "Nevermind!  Never  mind  her — or  him  either. 
I  will  take  care  of  the  two  of  them!" 

A  low  laugh  tinkled  from  the  ancestress:  "Ha,  ha! 
you  thought  the  fool  would  be  scandalized,  and  instead 
he  is  only  the  more  enamored." 

The  girl  flinched  but  kept  her  face  to  the  window: 
"He  is  not  the  fool." 

"No?    We  can  hardly  tell,  when  we  are — in  love." 

Flora  wheeled  and  flared,  but  caught  herself,  mu 
singly  crossed  the  room,  returned  half-way,  and  with 
frank  design  resumed  the  stool  warily  vacated  by  the 
unslippered  foot;  whose  owner  was  mincing  on,  just 

in 


KincaicTs  Battery 

enough  fluttered  to  play  defiance  while  shifting  her 
attack — 

"  Home,  sweet  home !  For  our  ravished  one  you  will, 
I  suppose,  permit  his  beloved  country  to  pay — in  its 
new  paper  money  at  'most  any  discount — and  call  it 
square,  eh  ?  "  Half  the  bitterness  of  her  tone  was  in  its 
sweetness. 

In  a  sudden  white  heat  the  granddaughter  clutched 
one  aged  knee  with  both  hands :  "  Wait !  If  I  don't  get 
seven  times  all  it  was  ever  worth,  the  Yankees  shall!" 
Then  with  an  odd  gladness  in  her  eyes  she  added, 
"And  she  shall  pay  her  share!" 

"  You  mean — his?"  asked  the  absorbed  embroiderer. 
But  on  her  last  word  she  stiffened  upward  with  a  low 
cry  of  agony,  shut  her  eyes  and  swung  her  head  as  if 
about  to  faint.  Flora  had  risen. 

"Oh-h-h!"  the  girl  softly  laughed,  "was  that  your 
foot?" 

XXIII 

"SOLDIERS!" 

WITH  what  innocent  openness  did  we  do  everything 
in  '61!  "Children  and  fools"  could  not  tell  the  truth 
any  faster  or  farther  than  did  our  newspapers — Pica 
yune,  Delta j  True  Delta,  Crescent,  UAbeille,  and  L'Es- 
tajette  du  Sud.  After  every  military  review  the  exact 
number  in  line  and  the  name  of  every  command  and 
commander  were  hurried  into  print.  When  at  last  we 
began  to  cast  siege  guns,  the  very  first  one  was  defiantly 
proclaimed  to  all  the  Confederacy's  enemies :  an  eight- 
inch  Dahlgren,  we  would  have  them  to  know.  Kincaid 

112 


"Soldiers!" 

and  his  foundry  were  given  full  credit,  and  the  defence 
named  where  the  "iron  monster"  was  to  go,  if  not  the 
very  embrasure  designated  into  which  you  must  fire  to 
dismount  it. 

The  ladies,  God  bless  them,  were  always  free  to  pass 
the  guard  on  the  city  side  of  that  small  camp  and  earth 
work,  where  with  the  ladies'  guns  "the  ladies'  man" 
had  worn  the  grass  off  all  the  plain  and  the  zest  of 
novelty  out  of  all  his  nicknamers,  daily  hammering — 
he  and  his  only  less  merciful  lieutenants — at  their  ever 
lasting  drill. 

Such  ladies!  Why  shouldn't  they  pass ?  Was  it  not 
safe  for  the  cause  and  just  as  safe  for  them  ?  Was  not 
every  maid  and  matron  of  them  in  the  "Ladies'  Society 
of  the  Confederate  Army" — whereof  Miss  Callender 
was  a  secretary  and  Miss  Valcour  one  of  the  treasurers  ? 
And  had  not  the  fellows  there,  owing  to  an  influence  or 
two  in  the  camp  itself  and  another  or  two  just  outside 
it,  all  become,  in  a  strong,  fine  sense  and  high  degree, 
ladies'  men?  It  was  good  for  them  spiritually,  and 
good  for  their  field  artillery  evolutions,  to  be  watched 
by  maidenly  and  matronly  eyes.  Quite  as  good  was  it, 
too,  for  their  occasional  heavy-gun  practice  with  two 
or  three  huge,  new-cast,  big-breeched  "hell-hounds," 
as  Charlie  and  others  called  them,  whose  tapering  black 
snouts  lay  out  on  the  parapet's  superior  slope,  fondled 
by  the  soft  Gulf  winds  that  came  up  the  river,  and 
snuffing  them  for  the  taint  of  the  enemy. 

One  afternoon  when  field-gun  manoeuvres  were  at  a 
close,  Kincaid  spoke  from  the  saddle.  Facing  him 
stood  his  entire  command,  "in  order  in  the  line,"  their 
six  shining  pieces  and  dark  caissons  and  their  twice  six 


KincaicTs  Battery 

six-horse  teams  stretching  back  in  six  statuesque  rows, 
each  of  the  three  lieutenants — Bartleson,  Villeneuve, 
Tracy — in  the  front  line,  midway  between  his  two  guns, 
the  artificers  just  six  yards  out  on  the  left,  and  guidon 
and  buglers  just  six  on  the  right.  At  the  commander's 
back  was  the  levee.  Only  now  it  had  been  empty  of 
spectators,  and  he  was  seizing  this  advantage. 

"Soldiers!"  It  was  his  first  attempt  since  the  flag 
presentation,  and  it  looked  as  though  he  would  falter, 
but  he  hardened  his  brow:  "Some  days  ago  you  were 
told  not  to  expect  marching  orders  for  a  week.  Well 
the  week's  up  and  we're  told  to  wait  another.  Now 
that  makes  me  every  bit  as  mad  as  it  makes  you!  I 
feel  as  restless  as  any  man  in  this  battery,  and  I  told  the 
commanding  general  to-day  that  you're  the  worst  dis 
contented  lot  I've  yet  seen,  and  that  I  was  proud  of  you 
for  it.  That's  all  I  said  to  him.  But !  if  there's  a  man 
here  who  doesn't  yet  know  the  difference  between  a 
soldierly  discontent  and  unsoldierly  grumbling  I  want 
him  to  GO!  Kincaid's  Battery  is  not  for  him.  Let 
him  transfer  to  infantry  or  cavalry.  Oh,  I  know  it's 
only  that  you  want  to  be  in  the  very  first  fight,  and 
that's  all  right!  But  what  we  can't  get  we  don't 
grumble  for  in  Kincaid's  Battery!" 

He  paused.  With  his  inspired  eyes  on  the  splendid 
array,  visions  of  its  awful  destiny  only  exalted  him. 
Yet  signs  which  he  dared  not  heed  lest  he  be  con 
founded  told  him  that  every  eye  so  fixed  on  his  was 
aware  of  some  droll  distraction.  He  must  speak  on. 

"My  boys!  as  sure  as  this  war  begins  it's  going  to 
last.  There  '11  be  lots  of  killing  and  dying,  and  I  warn 
you  now,  your  share'll  be  a  double  one.  So,  then,  no 

114 


"Soldiers!" 

indecent  haste.  Artillery  can't  fight  every  day.  Cav 
alry  can — in  its  small  way,  but  you  may  have  to  wait 
months  and  months  to  get  into  a  regular  hell  on  earth. 
All  the  same  you'll  get  there! — soon  enough — times 
enough.  Don't  you  know  why,  when  we  have  to  be 
recruited — to  fill  up  the  shot  holes — they'll  go  by  the 
cavalry  to  the  infantry,  and  pick  the  best  men  there, 
and  promote  them  to  your  ranks  ?  It's  because  of  how 
you've  got  to  fight  when  your  turn  comes;  like  devils, 
to  hold  up,  for  all  you  may  know,  the  butt  end  of  the 
whole  day's  bloody  business.  That's  why — and  be 
cause  of  how  you  may  have  to  wait,  un-com-plain-ing, 
in  rotting  idleness  for  the  next  tea  party." 

Again  he  ceased.  What  was  the  matter  ?  There  sat 
his  matchless  hundred,  still  and  straight  as  stone 
Egyptians,  welcoming  his  every  word;  yet  some  influ 
ence  not  his  was  having  effect  and,  strangest  of  all,  was 
enhancing  his. 

"One  more  word,"  he  said.  "You're  sick  of  the 
drill-ground.  Well,  the  man  that's  spoiling  for  a  fight 
and  yet  has  no  belly  for  drill — he — oh,  he  belongs  to 
the  cavalry  by  birth!  We  love  these  guns.  We're 
mighty  dogg —  we're  extremely  proud  of  them.  Through 
thick  and  thin,  through  fire  and  carnage  and  agony,  re 
membering  where  we  got  them,  we  propose  to  keep 
them;  and  some  proud  day,  when  the  trouble's  all  over, 
say  two  years  hence,  and  those  of  us  who  are  spared 
come  home,  we  propose  to  come  with  these  same  guns 
unstained  by  the  touch  of  a  foe's  hand,  a  virgin  battery 
still.  Well,  only  two  things  can  win  that:  infernal 
fighting  and  perpetual  toil.  So,  as  you  love  honor 
and  your  country's  cause,  wait.  Wait  in  self-respect- 
US 


Kincaid's  Battery 

ful  patience.  Wait  and  work,  and  you  shall  be  at  the 
front — the  foremost  front ! — the  very  first  day  and  hour 
my  best  licks  can  get  you  there.  That's  all." 

Bartleson  advanced  from  the  line:  "By  section!"  he 
called,  "right  wheel " 

"Section,"  repeated  each  chief  of  section,  "right 
wheel " 

"March!"  commanded  Bartleson. 

"March,"  echoed  the  chiefs,  and  the  battery  broke 
into  column.  "  Forward !  Guide  right ! "  chanted  Bar 
tleson,  and  all  moved  off  save  Kincaid. 

He  turned  his  horse,  and  lo!  on  the  grassy  crest  of 
the  earthwork,  pictured  out  against  the  eastern  pink 
and  blue,  their  summer  gauzes  filled  with  the  light  of 
the  declining  sun,  were  half  a  dozen  smiling  ladies  at 
tended  by  two  or  three  officers  of  cavalry,  and  among 
them  Flora,  Constance,  and  Miranda. 

Anna  ?  Only  when  he  had  dismounted  did  his  eager 
eye  find  her,  where  she  had  climbed  and  seated  herself 
on  a  siege  gun  and  was  letting  a  cavalier  show  her  how 
hard  it  would  be  for  a  hostile  ship,  even  a  swift  steamer, 
to  pass,  up-stream,  this  crater  of  destruction,  and  ergo 
how  impossible  for  a  fleet — every  ship  a  terror  to  its 
fellows  the  moment  it  was  hurt — to  run  the  gauntlet  of 
Forts  Jackson  and  St.  Philip  on  a  far  worse  stretch  of 
raging  current  some  eighty  miles  farther  down  the  river. 

Not  for  disbelief  of  the  demonstration,  but  because 
of  a  general  laugh  around  a  tilt  of  words  between  Kin 
caid  and  the  cavalry  fellows,  Anna  lighted  down  and 
faced  about,  to  find  him,  for  the  third  time  in  five  days, 
at  close  range.  With  much  form  he  drew  nearer,  a 
bright  assurance  in  his  eyes,  a  sort  of  boyish  yes,  for  a 

116 


Can  a  Parked  Battery  Raise  a  Dust? 

moment,  but  the  next  moment  gone  as  it  met  in  hers  ; 
womanly  no. 

"You  little  artist,"  thought  Flora. 


XXIV 

CAN    A   PARKED    BATTERY    RAISE    A    DUST? 

DOWN  in  the  camp  the  battery  was  forming  into 
park;  a  pretty  movement.  The  ladies  watched  it,  the 
cavalrymen  explaining.  Now  it  was  done.  The  com 
mand  broke  ranks,  and  now  its  lieutenants  joined  the 
fair  company  and  drank  its  eulogies — grimly,  as  one 
takes  a  dram. 

Back  among  the  tents  and  mess  fires — 

"Fellows!"  said  the  boys,  in  knots,  "yonder's  how  he 
puts  in  his  'best  licks'  for  us!"  But  their  wanton  gaze 
was  also  fond  as  it  followed  the  procession  of  parasols 
and  sword-belts,  muslins  and  gold  lace  that  sauntered 
down  along  the  levee's  crest  in  couples,  Hilary  and 
Anna  leading. 

Flora,  as  they  went,  felt  a  most  unusual  helplessness 
to  avert  a  course  of  things  running  counter  to  her 
designs.  It  is  true  that,  having  pledged  herself  to  the 
old  General  to  seek  a  certain  issue  and  to  Irby  to  pre 
vent  it,  she  might,  whichever  way  the  matter  drifted, 
gather  some  advantage  if  she  could  contrive  to  claim 
credit  for  the  trend;  an  if  which  she  felt  amply  able  to 
take  care  of.  To  keep  two  men  fooled  was  no  great  feat, 
nor  even  to  beguile  her  grandmother,  whose  gadfly  in 
sistence  centred  ever  on  the  Brodnax  fortune  as  their 
only  true  objective;  but  so  to  control  things  as  not  to 

117 


Kincaid's  Battery 

fool  herself  at  last — that  was  the  pinch.  It  pinched 
more  than  it  would  could  she  have  heard  how  poorly  at 
this  moment  the  lover  and  lass  were  getting  on — as 
such.  Her  subtle  interferences — a  mere  word  yester 
day,  another  the  day  before — were  having  more  suc 
cess  than  she  imagined,  not  realizing  how  much  they 
were  aided  by  that  frantic  untamableness  to  love's 
yoke,  which,  in  Hilary  only  less  than  in  Anna,  quali 
fied  every  word  and  motion. 

Early  in  the  talk  of  these  two  Hilary  had  mentioned 
his  speech  just  made,  presently  asking  with  bright  ab 
ruptness  how  Anna  liked  it  and,  while  Anna  was  getting 
her  smile  ready  for  a  safe  reply,  had  added  that  he  never 
could  have  made  it  at  all  had  he  dreamed  she  was 
looking  on.  "Now  if  she  asks  why,"  he  thought  to 
himself  in  alarm,  "I've  got  to  blurt  it  out!" 

But  she  failed  to  ask;  only  confessed  herself  unfit  to 
judge  anybody's  English. 

"English!  oh,  pass  the  English!"  he  said,  he  "knew 
how  bad  that  was."  What  he  wanted  her  criticism  on 
was — "its  matter — its  spirit — whichever  it  was,  matter 
or  spirit!"  How  comical  that  sounded!  They  took 
pains  that  their  laugh  should  be  noticed  behind 
them.  Flora  observed  both  the  laugh  and  the  pains 
taking. 

"Matter  or  spirit,"  said  Anna  more  gravely,  "I  can't 
criticise  it.  I  can't  even  praise  it — oh!  but  that's  only 
be — because  I  haven't — the  courage!" 

The  lover's  reply  was  low  and  full  of  meaning: 
"Would  you  praise  it  if  you  had  the  courage?" 

She  could  have  answered  trivially,  but  something 
within  bade  her  not.  "Yes,"  she  murmured,  "I 

118 


Can  a  Parked  Battery  Raise  a  Dust? 

would."  It  was  an  awful  venture,  made  unpreparedly, 
and  her  eyes,  trying  to  withstand  his,  dropped.  Yet 
they  rallied  splendidly — " They've  got  to!"  said  some 
thing  within  her — and,  "I  could,"  she  blushingly 
qualified,  "but — I  could  criticise  it  too!" 

His  heart  warmed  at  her  defiant  smile.  "Fd  rather 
have  that  honor  than  a  bag  of  gold!"  he  said,  and  saw 
his  slip  too  late.  Gold!  Into  Anna's  remembrance 
flashed  the  infatuation  of  the  poor  little  schoolmistress, 
loomed  Flora's  loss  and  distress  and  rolled  a  smoke  of 
less  definite  things  for  which  this  man  was  going  un 
punished  while  she,  herself,  stood  in  deadly  peril  of 
losing  her  heart  to  him. 

"Oh,  Captain  Kincaid!"  Like  artillery  wheeling 
into  action  came  her  inconsequent  criticism,  her  eyes 
braving  him  at  last,  as  bright  as  his  guns,  though  flash 
ing  only  tears.  "It  was  right  enough  for  you  to  extol 
those  young  soldiers'  willingness  to  serve  their  country 
when  called.  But,  oh,  how  could  you  commend  their 
chafing  for  battle  and  slaughter?" 

"Ah,  Miss  Anna,  you " 

"Oh,  when  you  know  that  the  sooner  they  go  the 
sooner  comes  the  heartache  and  heartbreak  for  the 
hundreds  of  women  they  so  light-heartedly  leave  behind 
them!  I  looked  from  Charlie  to  Flora " 

"You  should  have  looked  to  Victor ine.  She  wants 
the  boy  to  go  and  her  dad  to  go  with  him." 

"Poor  thoughtless  child!" 

"Why,  Miss  Anna,  if  I  were  a  woman,  and  any  man 
— with  war  coming  on — could  endure  to  hang  back  at 
home  for  love  of  me,  I  should  feel " 

"Captain  Kincaid!  What  we  womenkind  may  feel 
119 


Kincaid's  Battery 

is  not  to  the  point.  It's  how  the  men  themselves  feel 
toward  the  women  who  love  them." 

"They  ought,"  replied  the  soldier,  and  his  low  voice 
thrilled  like  a  sounding-board,  "to  love  the  women — 
out  of  every  fibre  of  their  being." 

"Ah!"  murmured  the  critic,  as  who  should  say, 
"checkmate!" 

"And  yet — "  persisted  this  self-sung  "ladies'  man" — 

"Yet  what?"  she  softly  challenged.  (Would  he 
stand  by  his  speech,  or  his  song?) 

"Why,  honestly,  Miss  Anna,  I  think  a  man  can  love 
a  woman — even  his  heart's  perfect  choice — too  much. 
I  know  he  can!" 

The  small  lady  gave  the  blunderer  a  grave,  brief, 
now-you-/taw-done-it  glance  and  looked  down.  "  Well, 
I  know,"  she  measuredly  said,  "that  a  man  who  can 
tell  a  woman  that,  isn't  capable  of  loving  her  half 
enough."  She  turned  to  go  back,  with  a  quickness 
which,  I  avow,  was  beautifully  and  tenderly  different 
from  irritation,  yet  which  caused  her  petticoat's  frail 
embroidery  to  catch  on  one  of  his  spurs  and  cling  till 
the  whole  laughing  bevy  had  gathered  round  to  jest 
over  Flora's  disentanglement  of  it. 

"But  really,  Nan,  you  know,"  said  Constance  that 
evening  in  their  home,  "you  used  to  believe  that 
yourself!  The  day  Steve  left  you  said  almost  ex 
act " 

"Con — ?  Ah,  Con!  I  think  the  sister  who  could 
remind  a  sister  of  that — !"  The  sufferer  went  slowly 
up  to  her  room,  where  half  an  hour  later  she  was  found 
by  Miranda  drying  her  bathed  eyes  at  a  mirror  and 

120 


"He  Must  Wait,"  Says  Anna 

instantly  pretending  that  her  care  was  for  any  other 
part  of  her  face  instead. 

"Singular,"  she  remarked,  "what  a  dust  that  battery 
can  raise!" 

XXV 

"HE    MUST   WAIT/'  SAYS    ANNA 

ABOUT  the  middle  of  the  first  week  in  April — when 
the  men  left  in  the  stores  of  Common,  Gravier,  Poydras, 
or  Tchoupitoulas  street  could  do  nothing  but  buy  the 
same  goods  back  and  forth  in  speculation  loathed  by 
all  who  did  not  do  it,  or  whittle  their  chairs  on  the 
shedded  sidewalks  and  swap  and  swallow  flaming 
rumors  and  imprecate  the  universal  inaction  and  mis 
management — there  embarked  for  Pensacola 

"What?    Kincaid's  Bat ?" 

"No-o,  the  Zouaves!  Infantry!  when  the  one  only 
sane  thing  to  do,"  cried  every  cannoneer  of  Camp 
Callender — in  its  white  lanes  or  on  three-hours'  leave 
at  home  on  Bayou  Road  or  Coliseum  Square  or  Elysian 
Fields  or  Prytania  street — "the  one  sane  thing  to  do," 
insisted  the  growingly  profane  lads  to  their  elders,  and 
assented  the  secretly  pained  elders  to  them,  "the  one 
thing  that,  if  only  for  shame's  sake,  ought  to  have  been 
done  long  ago,  was  to  knock  Fort  Pickens  to  HELL 
with  SHELL!"  Sadly  often  they  added  the  tritest 
three-monosyllabled  expletive  known  to  red-hot  Eng 
lish. 

Charlie — mm-mm!  how  he  could  rip  it  out!  Sam 
Gibbs,  our  veritable  Sam,  sergeant  of  the  boy's  gun, 
"Roaring  Betsy,"  privately  remarked  to  the  Captain 

121 


Kincaid's  Battery 

what  a  blank-blank  shame  it  was,  not  for  its  trivial  self, 
of  course,  but  in  view  of  the  corruptions  to  which  it 
opened  the  way.  And  the  blithe  commander,  in  the 
seclusion  of  his  tent,  standing  over  the  lad  and  holding 
him  tenderly  by  both  pretty  ears,  preached  to  him  of 
his  sister  and  grandmother  until  with  mute  rage  the 
youngster  burned  as  red  as  his  jacket  facings;  and 
then  of  the  Callenders — "who  gave  us  our  guns,  and 
one  of  whom  is  the  godmother  of  our  flag,  Charlie" — 
until  the  tears  filled  Charlie's  eyes,  and  he  said : 

"I'll  try,  Captain,  but  it's — oh,  it's  no  use!  If  any 
thing  could  make  me  swear  worse" — he  smiled  despair 
ingly — "it  would  be  the  hope  of  being  hauled  up  again 
for  another  talk  like  this!" 

One  Sunday,  three  days  after  the  going  of  the  Zouaves, 
while  out  in  Jackson  Square  "Roaring  Betsy"  sang  a 
solo  of  harrowing  thunder-claps,  the  Callenders  and 
Valcours,  under  the  cathedral's  roof,  saw  consecrated 
in  its  sacred  nave  the  splendid  standard  of  the  Chas- 
seurs-a-Pied. 

Armed  guards,  keeping  the  rabble  out,  passed  the 
ladies  in  before  the  procession  had  appeared  in  the  old 
Rue  Conde.  But  now  here  it  came,  its  music  swelling, 
the  crowd — shabbier  than  last  month  and  more  vacant 
of  face — parting  before  it.  Carrying  their  sabres,  but 
on  foot  and  without  their  pieces,  heading  the  column  as 
escort  of  honor,  lo,  Kincaid's  Battery;  rearmost  the 
Chasseurs,  masses  and  masses  of  them;  and  in  be 
tween,  a  silver  crucifix  lifted  high  above  a  body  of 
acolytes  in  white  lace  over  purple,  ranks  of  black- 
gowned  priests,  a  succession  of  cloth-of-gold  ecclesias 
tics,  and  in  their  midst  the  mitred  archbishop. 

122 


"He  Must  Wait,"  Says  Anna 

But  the  battery!  What  a  change  since  last  February! 
Every  man  as  spruce  as  ever,  but  with  an  added  air  of 
tested  capability  that  inspired  all  beholders.  Only 
their  German  musicians  still  seemed  fresh  from  the  mint, 
and  oh !  in  what  unlucky  taste,  considering  the  ecclesias 
tics,  the  song  they  brayed  forth  in  jaunty  staccato. 

"They're  offering  us  that  hand  of  theirs  again,"  mur 
mured  Anna  to  Constance,  standing  in  a  side  pew ;  but 
suddenly  the  strain  ceased,  she  heard  Hilary's  voice  of 
command  turning  the  column,  and  presently,  through  a 
lane  made  by  his  men,  the  Chasseurs  marched  in  to  the 
nave,  packed  densely  and  halted.  Then  in  close  order 
the  battery  itself  followed  and  stood.  Now  the  loud 
commands  were  in  here.  Strange  it  was  to  hear  them 
ring  through  the  holy  place  (French  to  the  Chasseurs, 
English  to  the  battery),  and  the  crashing  musket-butts 
smite  the  paved  floor  as  one  weapon,  to  the  flash  of  a 
hundred  sabres. 

So  said  to  itself  the  diary  on  the  afternoon  of  the  next 
day,  and  there  hurriedly  left  off.  Not  because  of  a  dull 
rumble  reaching  the  writer's  ear  from  the  Lake,  where 
Kincaid  and  his  lieutenants  were  testing  new-siege- 
guns,  for  that  was  what  she  was  at  this  desk  and 
window  to  hear;  but  because  of  the  L.  S.  C.  A.,  about 
to  meet  in  the  drawing-room  below  and  be  met  by  a 
friend  of  the  family,  a  famed  pulpit  orator  and  greater 
potentate,  in  nl£ny  eyes,  than  even  the  Catholic  arch 
bishop. 

He  came,  and  later,  in  the  battery  camp  with  the 
Callenders,  Valcours,  and  Victorine,  the  soldiers  clam 
oring  for  a  speech,  ran  them  wild  reminding  them 
with  what  unique  honor  and  peculiar  responsibility 

123 


Kincaid's  Battery 

they  were  the  champions  of  their  six  splendid  guns. 
In  a  jostling  crowd,  yet  with  a  fine  decorum,  they 
brought  out  their  standard  and — not  to  be  outdone 
by  any  Chasseurs  under  the  sky — obliged  Anna  to 
stand  beside  its  sergeant,  Maxime,  and  with  him  hold 
it  while  the  man  of  God  invoked  Heaven  to  bless  it 
and  bless  all  who  should  follow  it  afield  or  pray  for  it 
at  home.  So  dazed  was  she  that  only  at  the  "amen" 
did  she  perceive  how  perfectly  the  tables  had  been 
turned  on  her.  For  only  then  did  she  discover  that 
Hilary  Kincaid  had  joined  the  throng  exactly  in  time  to 
see  the  whole  tableau. 

Every  officer  of  the  camp  called  that  evening,  to  say 
graceful  things,  Kincaid  last.  As  he  was  leaving  he 
wanted  to  come  to  the  same  old  point,  but  she  would 
not  let  him.  Oh !  how  could  she,  a  scant  six  hours  after 
such  a  bid  from  herself  ?  He  ought  to  have  seen  she 
couldn't — and  wouldn't !  But  he  never  saw  anything — 
of  that  sort.  Ladies'  man  indeed!  He  couldn't  read 
a  girl's  mind  even  when  she  wanted  it  read.  He  went 
away  looking  so  haggard — and  yet  so  tender — and 
still  so  determined — she  could  not  sleep  for  hours. 
Nevertheless 

"I  can't  help  his  looks,  Con,  he's  got  to  wait!  I 
owe  that  to  all  womanhood !  He's  got  to  practise  to  me 
what  he  preaches  to  his  men.  Why,  Connie,  if  Pm 
willing  to  wait,  why  shouldn't  he  be?  Why ?" 

Constance  fled. 

Next  day,  dining  with  Doctor  Sevier,  said  the  Doctor, 
"That  chap's  working  himself  to  death,  Anna,"  and 
gave  his  fair  guest  such  a  stern  white  look  that  she  had 
to  answer  flippantly. 

124 


"He  Must  Wait,"  Says  Anna 

She  and  Hilary  were  paired  at  table  and  talked  of 
Flora,  he  telling  how  good  a  friend  to  her  Flora  was. 
The  topic  was  easier,  between  them,  than  at  any  other 
time  since  the  loss  of  the  gold.  Always  before,  she  had 
felt  him  thinking  of  that  loss  and  trying  to  guess  some 
thing  about  her;  but  now  she  did  not,  for  on  Sunday, 
in  the  cathedral,  Flora  had  told  her  at  last,  ever  so 
gratefully  and  circumstantially,  that  she  had  repaid  the 
Captain  everything!  yes,  the  same  day  on  which  she  had 
first  told  Anna  of  the  loss;  and  there  was  nothing  now 
left  to  do  but  for  her  to  reimburse  Anna  the  moment 
she  could. 

Hilary  spoke  of  Adolphe's  devotion  to  Flora — hoped 
he  would  win.  Told  with  great  amusement  how  really 
well  his  cousin  had  done  with  her  government  claim — 
sold  it  to  his  Uncle  Brodnax!  And  Flora — how  pict 
uresque  everything  she  did! — had  put — ?  yes,  they 
both  knew  the  secret — had  put  the  proceeds  into  one  of 
those  beautiful  towboats  that  were  being  fitted  up  as 
privateers!  Hilary  laughed  with  delight.  Yes,  it  was 
for  that  sort  of  thing  the  boys  were  so  fond  of  her.  But 
when  Anna  avowed  a  frank  envy  he  laughed  with  a 
peculiar  tenderness  that  thrilled  both  him  and  her,  and 
murmured : 

"The  dove  might  as  well  envy  the  mocking-bird." 

"If  I  were  a  dove  I  certainly  should,"  she  said. 

"Well,  you  are,  and  you  shouldn't!"  said  he. 

All  of  which  Flora  caught;  if  not  the  words,  so  truly 
the  spirit  that  the  words  were  no  matter. 

"Just  as  we  were  starting  home,"  soliloquized,  that 
night,  our  diary,  "the  newsboys  came  crying  all  around, 
that  General  Beauregard  had  opened  fire  on  Fort  Sum- 

125 


Kincaid's  Battery 

ter,  and  the  war  has  begun.     Poor  Constance !  it's  little 
she'll  sleep  to-night." 

XXVI 

SWIFT    GOING,    DOWN    STREAM 

STRANGELY  slow  travelled  news  in  '61.  After  thirty 
hours'  bombardment  Fort  Sumter  had  fallen  before 
any  person  in  New  Orleans  was  sure  the  attack  had 
been  made.  When  five  days  later  a  yet  more  stu 
pendous  though  quieter  thing  occurred,  the  tidings 
reached  Kincaid's  Battery  only  on  the  afternoon  of  the 
next  one  in  fair  time  to  be  read  at  the  close  of  dress 
parade.  But  then  what  shoutings!  The  wondering 
Callenders  were  just  starting  for  a  drive  up-town.  At 
the  grove  gate  their  horses  were  frightened  out  of  all 
propriety  by  an  opening  peal,  down  in  the  camp,  from 
"Roaring  Betsy."  And  listen! 

The  black  driver  drew  in.  From  Jackson  Square 
came  distant  thunders  and  across  the  great  bend  of  the 
river  they  could  see  the  white  puff  of  each  discharge. 
What  could  it  mean  ? 

"Oh,  Nan,  the  Abolitionists  must  have  sued  for 
peace!"  exclaimed  the  sister. 

" No-no ! "  cried  Miranda.     "Hark ! " 

Behind  them  the  battery  band  had  begun — 

"O,  carry  me  back  to  old  Vir " 

"Virginia!"  sang  the  three.  "Virginia  is  out!  Oh, 
Virginia  is  out ! "  They  clapped  their  mitted  hands  and 
squeezed  each  other's  and  laughed  with  tears  and  told 
the  coachman  and  said  it  over  and  over. 

126 


Swift  Going,  Down  Stream 

In  Canal  Street  lo!  it  was  true.  Across  the  Neutral 
Ground  they  saw  a  strange  sight;  General  Brodnax 
bareheaded !  bareheaded  yet  in  splendid  uniform,  riding 
quietly  through  the  crowd  in  a  brilliantly  mounted 
group  that  included  Irby  and  Kincaid,  while  everybody 
told  everybody,  with  admiring  laughter,  how  the  old 
Virginian,  dining  at  the  St.  Charles  Hotel,  had  sallied 
into  the  street  cheering,  whooping,  and  weeping,  thrown 
his  beautiful  cap  into  the  air,  jumped  on  it  as  it  fell,  and 
kicked  it  before  him  up  to  one  corner  and  down  again 
to  the  other.  Now  he  and  his  cavalcade  came  round 
the  Clay  statue  and  passed  the  carriage  saluting.  What 
glory  was  in  their  eyes!  How  could  our  trio  help  but 
wave  or  the  crowd  hold  back  its  cheers! 

Up  at  Odd  Fellows'  Hall  a  large  company  was  or 
ganizing  a  great  military  fair.  There  the  Callenders 
were  awaited  by  Flora  and  Madame,  thither  they 
came,  and  there  reappeared  the  General  and  his  train. 
There,  too,  things  had  been  so  admirably  cut  and  dried 
that  in  a  few  minutes  the  workers  were  sorted  and  busy 
all  over  the  hall  like  classes  in  a  Sunday-school. 

The  Callenders,  Valcours,  and  Victorine  were  a 
committee  by  themselves  and  could  meet  at  Callender 
House.  So  when  Kincaid  and  Irby  introduced  a  naval 
lieutenant  whose  amazingly  swift  despatch-boat  was 
bound  on  a  short  errand  a  bend  or  so  below  English 
Turn,  it  was  agreed  with  him  in  a  twinkling — a  few 
twinklings,  mainly  Miranda's — to  dismiss  horses,  take 
the  trip,  and  on  the  return  be  set  ashore  at  Camp 
Callender  by  early  moonlight. 

They  went  aboard  at  the  head  of  Canal  Street.  The 
river  was  at  a  fair  stage,  yet  how  few  craft  were  at 

127 


Kincaid's  Battery 

either  long  landing,  "upper"  or  "lower,"  where  so 
lately  there  had  been  scant  room  for  their  crowding 
prows.  How  few  drays  and  floats  came  and  went  on 
the  white,  shell-paved  levees!  How  little  freight  was 
to  be  seen  except  what  lay  vainly  begging  for  export — 
sugar,  molasses,  rice;  not  even  much  cotton;  it  had 
gone  to  the  yards  and  presses.  That  natty  regiment, 
the  Orleans  Guards,  was  drilling  (in  French,  superbly) 
on  the  smooth,  empty  ground  where  both  to  Anna's 
and  to  Flora's  silent  notice  all  the  up-river  food-stuffs — 
corn,  bacon,  pork,  meal,  flour — were  so  staringly  ab 
sent,  while  down  in  yonder  streets  their  lack  was  be 
ginning  to  be  felt  by  a  hundred  and  twenty-five  thou 
sand  consumers. 

Backing  out  into  mid-stream  brought  them  near  an 
anchored  steamer  lately  razeed  and  now  being  fitted 
for  a  cloud  of  canvas  on  three  lofty  masts  instead  of 
the  two  small  sticks  she  had  been  content  with  while 
she  brought  plantains,  guava  jelly,  coffee,  and  cigars 
from  Havana.  The  Sumter  she  was  to  be,  and  was 
designed  to  deliver  some  of  the  many  agile  counter- 
thrusts  we  should  have  to  make  against  that  "block 
ade"  for  which  the  Yankee  frigates  were  already  hover 
ing  off  Ship  Island.  So  said  the  Lieutenant,  but  Con 
stance  explained  to  him  (Captain  Mandeville  having 
explained  to  her)  what  a  farce  that  blockade  was  going 
to  be. 

How  good  were  these  long  breaths  of  air  off  the  sea 
marshes,  enlivened  by  the  speed  of  the  craft !  But  how 
unpopulous  the  harbor!  What  a  crowd  of  steamboats 
were  laid  up  along  the  "Algiers"  shore,  and  of  Mor 
gan's  Texas  steamers,  that  huddled,  with  boilers  cold, 

128 


Swift  Going,  Down  Stream 

under  Slaughter-House  Point,  while  all  the  dry-docks 
stood  empty.  How  bare  the  ship  wharves;  hardly  a 
score  of  vessels  along  the  miles  of  city  front.  About  as 
many  more,  the  lieutenant  said,  were  at  the  river's 
mouth  waiting  to  put  to  sea,  but  the  towboats  were  all 
up  here  being  turned  into  gunboats  or  awaiting  letters 
of  marque  and  reprisal  in  order  to  nab  those  very  ships 
the  moment  they  should  reach  good  salt  water.  Con 
stance  and  Miranda  tingled  to  tell  him  of  their  brave 
Flora's  investment,  but  dared  not,  it  was  such  a  secret! 

On  a  quarter  of  the  deck  where  they  stood  alone, 
what  a  striking  pair  were  Flora  and  Irby  as  side  by 
side  they  faced  the  ruffling  air,  softly  discussing  matters 
alien  to  the  gliding  scene  and  giving  it  only  a  dissimula- 
tive  show  of  attention.  Now  with  her  parasol  he 
pointed  to  the  sunlight  in  the  tree  tops  of  a  river  grove 
where  it  gilded  the  windows  of  the  Ursulines'  Con 
vent. 

"Hum!"  playfully  murmured  Kincaid  to  Anna, 
"he  motions  as  naturally  as  if  that  was  what  they  were 
talking  about." 

"It's  a  lovely  picture,"  argued  Anna. 

"Miss  Anna,  when  a  fellow's  trying  to  read  the  book 
of  his  fate  he  doesn't  care  for  the  pictures." 

"How  do  you  know  that's  what  he's  doing?" 

"He's  always  doing  it!"  laughed  Hilary. 

The  word  was  truer  than  he  meant.  The  Irby-value 
of  things  was  all  that  ever  seriously  engaged  the  ever 
serious  cousin.  Just  now  his  eyes  had  left  the  shore, 
where  Flora's  lingered,  and  he  was  speaking  of  Kin 
caid.  "  I  see,"  he  said,  "  what  you  think :  that  although 
no  one  of  these  things — uncle  Brodnax's  nonsense, 

129 


Kincaid's  Battery 

Greenleaf's  claims,  Hilary's  own  preaching  against — 
against,  eh " 

"Making  brides  to-day  and  widows  to-morrow?" 

"Yes,  that  while  none  of  these  is  large  enough  in 
his  view  to  stop  him  by  itself,  yet  combined  they " 

"All  working  together  they  do  it,"  said  the  girl. 
Really  she  had  no  such  belief,  but  Irby's  poor  wits 
were  so  nearly  useless  to  her  that  she  found  amusement 
in  misleading  them. 

"Hilary  tells  me  they  do,"  he  replied,  "but  the  more 
he  says  it  the  less  I  believe  him.  Miss  Flora,  the  fate 
of  all  my  uncle  holds  dear  is  hanging  by  a  threadt  a 
spider's  web,  a  young  girl's  freak!  If  ever  she  gives 
him  a  certain  turn  of  the  hand,  the  right  glance  of  her 
eye,  he'll  be  at  her  feet  and  every  hope  I  cherish " 

"  Captain  Irby,"  Flora  softly  asked  with  her  tinge  of 
accent,  "is  not  this  the  third  time?" 

"Yes,  if  you  mean  again  that " 

"That  Anna,  she  is  my  dear,  dear  frienM  The  fate 
of  nothing,  of  nobody,  not  even  of  me — or  of — you — " 
she  let  that  pronoun  catch  in  her  throat — "can  make 
me  to  do  anything — oh !  or  even  to  wish  anything — not 
the  very,  very  best  for  her!" 

"Yet  I  thought  it  was  our  understanding " 

"  Captain :  There  is  bitwin  us  no  understanding  ex- 
cep'" — the  voice  grew  tender — "that  there  is  no  under 
standing  bitwin  us."  But  she  let  her  eyes  so  meltingly 
avow  the  very  partnership  her  words  denied,  that  Irby 
felt  himself  the  richest,  in  understandings,  of  all  men 
alive. 

"What  is  that  they  are  looking?"  asked  his  idol, 
watching  Anna  and  Hilary.  The  old  battle  ground  had 

130 


Hard  Going,  Up  Stream 

been  passed.  Anna,  gazing  back  toward  its  townward 
edge,  was  shading  her  eyes  from  the  burnished  water, 
and  Hilary  was  helping  her  make  out  the  earthwork 
from  behind  which  peered  the  tents  of  Kincaid's  Bat 
tery  while  beyond  both  crouched  low  against  the  bright 
west  the  trees  and  roof  of  Callender  House — as  straight 
in  line  from  here,  Flora  took  note,  as  any  shot  or  shell 
might  ever  fly. 

XXVII 
*«. 

HARD    GOING,    UP    STREAM 

VERY  pleasant  it  was  to  stand  thus  on  the  tremulous 
deck  of  the  swiftest  craft  in  the  whole  Confederate 
service.  Pleasant  to  see  on  either  hand  the  flat  land 
scape  with  all  its  signs  of  safety  and  plenty;  its  orange 
groves,  its  greening  fields  of  young  sugar-cane,  its  pil 
lared  and  magnolia-shaded  plantation  houses,  its  white 
lines  of  slave  cabins  in  rows  of  banana  trees,  and  its 
wide  wet  plains  swarming  with  wild  birds;  pleasant  to 
see  it  swing  slowly,  majestically  back  and  melt  into  a 
skyline  as  low  and  level  as  the  ocean's. 

Anna  and  Kincaid  went  inside  to  see  the  upper  and 
more  shining  portions  of  the  boat's  beautiful  ma 
chinery.  No  one  had  yet  made  rods,  cranks,  and  gauge- 
dials  sing  anthems;  but  she  knew  it  was  Hilary  and  an 
artisan  or  two  in  his  foundry  whose  audacity  in  the  re 
making  of  these  gliding,  plunging,  turning,  vanishing, 
and  returning  members  had  given  them  their  fine  new 
speed-making  power,  and  as  he  stood  at  her  side  and 
pointed  from  part  to  part  tjiey  took  on  a  living  charm 
that  was  reflected  into  him.  Pleasant  it  was,  also,  to 


KincaicTs  Battery 

hear  two  or  three  droll  tales  about  his  battery  boys; 
the  personal  traits,  propensities,  and  soldierly  value  of 
many  named  by  name,  and  the  composite  character 
and  temper  that  distinguished  the  battery  as  a  com 
mand;  this  specific  quality  of  each  particular  organic 
unit,  fighting  body,  among  their  troops  being  as  needful 
for  commanders  to  know  as  what  to  count  on  in  the 
individual  man.  So  explained  the  artillerist  while  the 
pair  idled  back  to  the  open  deck.  With  hidden  vivid 
ness  Anna  liked  the  topic.  Had  not  she  a  right,  the 
right  of  a  silent  partner?  A  secret  joy  of  the  bond 
settled  on  her  like  dew  on  the  marshes,  as  she  stood  at 
his  side. 

Hilary  loved  the  theme.  The  lives  of  those  boys 
were  in  his  hands;  at  times  to  be  hoarded,  at  times  to 
be  spent,  in  sudden  awful  junctures  to  be  furiously 
squandered.  He  did  not  say  this,  but  the  thought  was 
in  both  of  them  and  drew  them  closer,  though  neither 
moved.  The  boat  rounded  to,  her  engines  stopped,  an 
officer  came  aboard  from  a  skiff,  and  now  she  was  under 
way  again  and  speeding  up  stream  on  her  return,  but 
Hilary  and  Anna  barely  knew  it.  He  began  to  talk  of 
the  boys'  sweethearts.  Of  many  of  their  tender  affairs 
he  was  confidentially  informed.  Yes,  to  be  frank,  he 
confessed  he  had  prompted  some  fellows  to  let  their 
hearts  lead  them,  and  to  pitch  in  and  win  while 

"Oh!  certainly !"  murmured  Anna  in  compassion, 
"some  of  them." 

"Yes,"  said  their  captain,  "but  they  are  chaps — 
like  Charlie — whose  hearts  won't  keep  unless  they're 
salted  down  and  barrelled,  and  I  give  the  advice  not 

in  the  sweethearts'  interest  but " 

132 


Hard  Going.  Up  Stream 

"Why  not?  Why  shouldn't  a "  The  word 

hung  back. 

"A  lover?" 

"Yes.  Why  shouldn't  he  confess  himself  in  her  in 
terest?  That  needn't  pledge  her." 

"Oh!  do  you  think  that  would  be  fair?" 

"Perfectly!" 

"Well,  now — take  an  actual  case.  Do  you  think  the 
mere  fact  that  Adolphe  truly  and  stick-to-it-ively  loves 
Miss  Flora  gives  her  a  right  to  know  it?" 

"I  do,  and  to  know  it  a  long,  long  time  before  he 
can  have  any  right  to  know  whether " 

"Hum!  while  he  goes  where  glory  waits  him ?" 

"Yes." 

"And  lets  time ?" 

"Yes." 

"And  absence  and  distance  and  rumor  try  his  un 
supported  constancy?" 

"Yes." 

With  tight  lips  the  soldier  drew  breath.  "You  know 
my  uncle  expects  now  to  be  sent  to  Virginia  at  once?" 

"Yes." 

"Adolphe,  of  course,  goes  with  him." 

"Yes." 

"Yet  you  think — the  great  principle  of  so-much-for- 
so-much  to  the  contrary  notwithstanding — he  really 
owes  it  to  her  to " 

Anna  moved  a  step  forward.  She  was  thinking  what 
a  sweet  babe  she  was,  thus  to  accept  the  surface  of 
things.  How  did  she  know  that  this  laughing,  light- 
spoken  gallant,  seemingly  so  open  and  artless — oh! 
more  infantile  than  her  very  self! — was  not  deep  and 

133 


Kincaid's  Battery 

complex?  Or  that  it  was  not  he  and  Flora  on  whose 
case  she  was  being  lured  to  speculate?  The  boat,  of 
whose  large  breathings  and  pulsings  she  became  grow- 
ingly  aware,  offered  no  reply.  Presently  from  the 
right  shore,  off  before  them,  came  a  strain  of  band 
music  out  of  Camp  Callender. 

"Anna." 

"What  hosts  of  stars!"  said  she.  "How  hoveringly 
they  follow  us." 

The  lover  waited.  The  ship  seemed  to  breathe 
deeper — to  glide  faster.  He  spoke  again:  "May  I  tell 
you  a  secret?" 

"Doesn't  the  boat  appear  to  you  to  tremble  more 
than  ever?"  was  the  sole  response. 

"Yes,  she's  running  up-stream.  So  am  I.  Anna, 
we're  off  this  time — sure  shot — with  the  General — to 
Virginia.  The  boys  don't  know  it  yet,  but — listen." 

Over  in  the  unseen  camp  the  strain  was  once  more — 

"I'd  offer  thee  this  hand  of  mine—" 

"We're  turning  in  to  be  landed,  are  we  not?"  asked 
Anna  as  the  stars  began  to  wheel. 

"Yes.  Do  you  really  believe,  Anna,  that  that  song 
is  not  the  true  word  for  a  true  lover  and  true  soldier, 
like  Adolphe,  for  instance — to  say  to  himself,  of  course, 
not  to  her?19 

"Oh,  Captain  Kincaid,  what  does  it  matter?" 

"Worlds  to  me.  Anna,  if  I  should  turn  that  song 
into  a  solemn  avowal — to  you " 

"Please  don't!— Oh,  I  mean— I  don't  mean— I— I 
mean " 

"Ah,  I  know  your  meaning.     But  if  I  love  you,  pro- 


Hard  Going,  Up  Stream 

foundly,  abidingly,  consumingly — as  I  do,  Anna  Cal- 
lender,  as  I  do ! — and  am  glad  to  pledge  my  soul  to  you 
knowing  perfectly  that  you  have  nothing  to  confess  to 
me " 

"Oh,  don't,  Captain  Kincaid,  don't!  You  are  not 
fair  to  me.  You  make  me  appear — oh — we  were  speak 
ing  only  of  your  cousin's  special  case.  I  don't  want 
your  confession.  I'm  not  ready  for — for  anybody's! 
You  mustn't  make  it!  You — you " 

"It's  made,  Anna  Callender,  and  it  makes  me  fair 
to  you  at  last." 

"Oh-h-h!" 

"I  know  that  matters  little  to  you " 

"Oh,  but  you're  farther  from  fair  than  ever,  Captain 
Kincaid;  you  got  my  word  for  one  thing  and  have  used 
it  for  another!"  She  turned  and  they  tardily  followed 
their  friends,  bound  for  the  gangway.  A  torch-basket 
of  pine-knots  blazing  under  the  bow  covered  flood  and 
land  with  crimson  light  and  inky  shadows.  The 
engines  had  stopped.  The  boat  swept  the  shore.  A 
single  stage-plank  lay  thrust  half  out  from  her  forward 
quarter.  A  sailor  stood  on  its  free  end  with  a  coil  of 
small  line.  The  crouching  earthwork  and  its  fierce 
guns  glided  toward  them.  Knots  of  idle  cannoneers 
stood  along  its  crest.  A  few  came  down  to  the  water's 
edge,  to  whom  Anna  and  Hilary,  still  paired  alone, 
were  a  compelling  sight.  They  lifted  their  smart  red 
caps.  Charlie  ventured  a  query:  "It's  true,  Captain, 
isn't  it,  that  Virginia's  out?" 

"I've  not  seen  her,"  was  the  solemn  reply,  and  his 
comrades  tittered. 

"Yes!"  called  Constance  and  Miranda,  "she's  out!" 

T35 


Kincaid's  Battery 

"Miss  Anna/'  murmured  Hilary  with  a  meekness  it 
would  have  avenged  Charlie  to  hear,  "I've  only  given 
you  the  right  you  claim  for  every  woman." 

"Oh,  Captain  Kincaid,  I  didn't  say  every  woman! 
I  took  particular — I — I  mean  I " 

"If  it's  any  one's  right  it's  yours." 

"I  don't  want  it! — I  mean — I  mean " 

"You  mean,  do  you  not?  that  I've  no  right  to  say 
what  can  only  distress  you." 

"Do  you  think  you  have? — Oh,  Lieutenant,  it's  been 
a  perfectly  lovely  trip!  I  don't  know  when  the  stars 
have  seemed  so  bright!" 

"They're  not  like  us  dull  men,  Miss  Callender,"  was 
the  sailor's  unlucky  reply,  "they  can  rise  to  any  occa 
sion  a  lady  can  make." 

"Ladies  don't  make  occasions,  Lieutenant." 

"Oh,  don't  they!"  laughed  the  sea-dog  to  Hilary. 
But  duty  called.  "No,  no,  Miss  Val— !  Don't  try 
that  plank  alone!  Captain  Kincaid,  will  you  give — ? 
That's  right,  sir.  .  .  .  Now,  Captain  Irby,  you  and 
Miss  Callender — steady!" 

Seventh  and  last  went  the  frail  old  lady,  led  by  Kin 
caid.  She  would  have  none  other.  She  kept  his  arm 
with  definite  design  while  all  seven  waved  the  departing 
vessel  good-by.  Then  for  the  walk  to  the  house  she 
shared  Irby  with  Anna  and  gave  Flora  to  Hilary,  with 
Miranda  and  Constance  in  front  outmanoeuvred  by  a 
sleight  of  hand  so  fleeting  and  affable  that  even  you  or  I 
would  not  have  seen  it. 


136 


The  Cup  of  Tantalus 

XXVIII 

THE    CUP    OF    TANTALUS 

QUEER  world.  Can  you  be  sure  the  next  pair  you 
meet  walking  together  of  a  summer  eve  are  as  starry  as 
they  look?  Lo,  Constance  and  Miranda.  Did  the 
bride  herself  realize  what  a  hunger  of  loneliness  was 
hers  ?  Or  Anna  and  Irby,  with  Madame  between  them. 
Could  you,  maybe,  have  guessed  the  veritable  tempest 
beneath  the  maiden's  serenity,  or  his  inward  gnashings 
against  whatever  it  was  that  had  blighted  his  hour  with 
the  elusive  Flora? 

Or  can  any  one  say,  in  these  lives  of  a  thousand  con 
cealments  and  restraints,  when  things  are  happening  and 
when  not,  within  us  or  without,  or  how  near  we  are  now  to 
the  unexpected — to  fate  ?  See,  Flora  and  Hilary.  He 
gave  no  outward  show  that  he  was  burning  to  flee  the 
spot  and  swing  his  fists  and  howl  and  tear  the  ground. 

Yet  Flora  knew;  knew  by  herself;  by  a  cold  rage  in 
her  own  fair  bosom,  where  every  faculty  stood  gayly 
alert  for  each  least  turn  of  incident,  to  foil  or  use  it, 
while  they  talked  lightly  of  Virginia's  great  step,  or  of 
the  night's  loveliness,  counting  the  stars.  "  How  small 
they  look,"  she  said,  "how  calm  how  still." 

"  Yes,  and  then  to  think  what  they  really  are  I  so  fear 
fully  far  from  small — or  cold — or  still  I" 

"Like  ourselves,"  she  prompted. 

"Yes!"  cried  the  transparent  soldier.  "At  our 
smallest  the  smallest  thing  in  us  is  that  we  should  feel 
small.  And  how  deep  down  are  we  calm  or  cold  ?  Miss 
Flora,  I  once  knew  a  girl — fine  outside,  inside.  Lovers 

137 


Kincaid's  Battery 

— she  had  to  keep  a  turnstile.  I  knew  a  pair  of  them. 
To  hear  those  two  fellows  separately  tell  what  she  was 
like,  you  couldn't  have  believed  them  speaking  of  the 
same  person.  The  second  one  thought  the  first  had 
— sort  o' — charted  her  harbor  for  him;  but  when  he 
came  to  sail  in,  'pon  my  soul,  if  every  shoal  on  the  chart 
wasn't  deep  water,  and  every  deep  water  a  fortified 
shore — ha,  ha,  ha!" 

Flora's  smile  was  lambent.  "Yes,"  she  said,  uthat 
sweet  Anna  she's  very  intric-ate."  Hilary  flamed  and 
caught  his  breath,  but  she  met  his  eyes  with  the  placidity 
of  the  sky  above  them. 

Suddenly  he  laughed:  *Now  I  know  what  I  am! 
Miss  Flora,  I — I  wish  you'd  be  my  pilot." 

She  gave  one  resenting  sparkle,  but  then  shook  her 
averted  head  tenderly,  murmured  "  Impossible,"  and 
smiled. 

"You  think  there's  no  harbor  there?" 

"Listen,"  she  said. 
'Yes,  I  hear  it,  a  horse." 

"Captain  Kincaid?" 

"Miss  Flora?" 

"For  dear  Anna's  sake  and  yours,  shall  I  be  that 
little  bit  your  pilot,  to  say ?" 

"What!  to  say,  Don't  see  her  to-night?" 

Flora's  brow  sank. 

"May  I  go  with  you,  then,  and  learn  why?"  The 
words  were  hurried,  for  a  horseman  was  in  front  and 
the  others  had  so  slackened  pace  that  all  were  again  in 
group.  Anna  caught  Flora's  reply: 

"No,  your  cousin  will  be  there.  But  to-morrow 
evening,  bif-ore " 

138 


The  Cup  of  Tantalus 

*  Yes, ' '  he  echoed,  "  before  anything  else.  I'll  come. 
Why!" — a  whinny  of  recognition  came  from  the  road — 
"why,  that's  my  horse!" 

The  horseman  dragged  in  his  rein.  Constance 
gasped  and  Kincaid  exclaimed,  "Well!  since  when  and 
from  where,  Steve  Mandeville?" 

The  rider  sprang  clanking  to  the  ground  and  whipped 
out  a  document.  All  pressed  round  him.  He  gave 
his  bride  two  furious  kisses,  held  her  in  one  arm  and 
handed  the  missive  to  Kincaid: 

"With  the  compliment  of  General  Brodnax!" 

Irby  edged  toward  Flora,  drawn  by  a  look. 

Hilary  spoke:  "Miss  Anna,  please  hold  this  paper 
open  for  me  while  I — Thank  you."  He  struck  a 
match.  The  horse's  neck  was  some  shelter  and  the 
two  pressed  close  to  make  more,  yet  the  match  flared. 
The  others  listened  to  Mandeville: 

"And  'twas  me  dizcover'  that  tranzportation,  juz' 
chanzing  to  arrive  by  the  railroad " 

"Any  one  got  a  newspaper?"  called  Hilary.  "Steve 
— yes,  let's  have  a  wisp  o'  that." 

The  paper  burned  and  Hilary  read.  "Always  the 
man  of  the  moment,  me!"  said  Mandeville.  "And 
also  't  is  thangs  to  me  you  are  the  firs'  inform',  and  if 
you  are  likewise  the  firs'  to  ripport " 

"Thank  you!"  cried  Kincaid,  letting  out  a  stirrup 
leather.  "Adolphe,  will  you  take  that  despatch  on  to 
Bartleson?"  He  hurried  to  the  other  stirrup. 

"Tell  him  no  I"  whispered  Flora,  but  in  vain,  so 
quickly  had  Anna  handed  Irby  the  order. 

"Good-night,  all!"  cried  Hilary,  mounting.  He 
wheeled,  swung  his  cap  and  galloped. 

139 


Kincaid's  Battery 

"Hear  him!"  laughed  Miranda  to  Flora,  and  from 
up  the  dim  way  his  song  came  back: 

"'I  can't  stand  the  wilderness 
But  a  few  days,  a  few  days.*" 

Still  swinging  his  cap  he  groaned  to  himself  and 
dropped  his  head,  then  lifted  it  high,  shook  his  locks 
like  a  swimmer,  and  with  a  soft  word  to  his  horse  sped 
faster. 

"  Yo*  pardon,  sir,"  said  Mandeville  to  Irby,  declining 
the  despatch,  "I  wou'n't  touch  it.  For  why  he  di'n' 
h-askme?  But  my  stable  is  juz  yondeh.  Go,  borrow 
you  a  horse — all  night  'f  you  like." 

Thence  Irby  galloped  to  Bartleson's  tent,  returned  to 
Callender  House,  dismounted  and  came  up  the  steps. 
There  stood  Anna,  flushed  and  eager,  twining  arms 
with  the  placid  Flora.  "Ah,"  said  the  latter,  as  he 
offered  her  his  escort  home,  "but  grandma  and  me, 
we " 

Anna  broke  in:  "They're  going  to  stay  here  all  night 
so  that  you  may  ride  at  once  to  General  Brodnax. 
Even  we  girls,  Captain  Irby,  must  do  all  we  can  to  help 
your  cousin  get  away  with  the  battery,  the  one  wish  of 
his  heart!"  She  listened,  untwined  and  glided  into  the 
house. 

Instantly  Flora  spoke :  "Go,  Adolphe  Irby,  go!  Ah, 
snatch  your  luck,  you  lucky — man!  Get  him  away  to 
night,  cost  what  cost1"  Her  fingers  pushed  him.  He 
kissed  them.  She  murmured  approvingly,  but  tore 
them  away:  "Go,  go,  go-ol" 

Anna,  pacing  her  chamber,  with  every  gesture  of 
self -arraignment  and  distress,  heard  him  gallop.  Then 

140 


The  Cup  of  Tantalus 

standing  in  her  opened  window  she  looked  off  across 
the  veranda's  balustrade  and  down  into  the  camp,  where 
at  lines  of  mess-fires  like  strings  of  burning  beads  the 
boys  were  cooking  three  days'  rations.  A  tap  came  on 
her  door.  She  snatched  up  a  toilet  brush:  "Come 
in?" 

She  was  glad  it  was  only  Flora.  "  Cherie,"  tinkled 
the  visitor,  "they  have  permit'  me!" 

Anna  beamed.  "  I  was  coming  down,"  she  recklessly 
replied,  touching  her  temples  at  the  mirror. 

"Yes,"  said  the  messenger,  "'cause  Mandeville  he 
was  biggening  to  tell  about  Fort  Sumter,  and  I  asked 
them  to  wait — ah" — she  took  Anna's  late  pose  in  the 
window — "how  plain  the  camp!" 

"Yes,"  responded  Anna  with  studied  abstraction, 
"when  the  window  happens  to  be  up.  It's  so  warm  to- 
night,  I " 

"Ah,  Anna!" 

"What,  dear?"  In  secret  panic  Anna  came  and 
looked  out  at  Flora's  side  caressingly. 

"At  last,"  playfully  sighed  the  Creole,  "'tis  good-by, 
Kincaid's  Battery.  Good-by,  you  hun'red  good  fellows, 
with  yo'  hun'red  horses  and  yo'  hun'red  wheels  and  yo' 
hun'red  hurras." 

"And  hundred  brave,  true  hearts!"  said  Anna. 

"Yes,  and  good-by,  Bartleson,  good-by,  Tracy,  good- 
by  ladies'  man ! — my  dear,  tell  me  once  more !  For  him 
why  always  that  name?"  Both  laughed. 

"I  don't  know,  unless  it's  because — well — isn't  it — 
because  every  lady  has  a  piece  of  his  heart  and — no  one 
wants  all  of  it?" 

"Ah!  no  one? — when  so  many? " 

141 


Kincaid's  Battery 

"Now,  Flora,  suppose  some  one  did!  What  of  it,  if 
he  can't,  himself,  get  his  whole  heart  together  to  give 
it  to  any  one?"  The  arguer  offered  to  laugh  again, 
but  Flora  was  sad: 

"You  bil-ieve  he's  that  way — Hilary  Kincaid?" 

"There  are  men  that  way,  Flora.  It's  hard  for  us 
women  to  realize,  but  it's  true!" 

"Ah,  but  for  him!    For  him  that's  a  dreadful!" 

"Why,  no,  dear,  I  fancy  he's  happiest  that  way." 

"But  not  best,  no!  And  there's  another  thing — his 
uncle!  You  know  ab-out  that,  I  su'pose?" 

"Yes,  but  he — come,  they'll  be  sending " 

"No, — no!  a  moment!  Anna!  Ah,  Anna,  you  are 
too  wise  for  me!  Anna,  do  you  think" — the  pair 
stood  in  the  room  with  the  inquirer's  eyes  on  the 
floor — "you  think  his  cousin  is  like  that?" 

Anna  kissed  her  temples,  one  in  pity,  the  other  in 
joy:  "No,  dear,  he's  not — Adolphe  Irby  is  not." 

On  the  way  downstairs  Flora  seized  her  hands: 
"  Oh,  Anna,  like  always — this  is  just  bit-win  us  ?  Ah, 
yes.  And,  oh,  I  wish  you'd  try  not  to  bil-ieve  that  way 
— ab-out  his  cousin!  Me,  I  hope  no!  And  yet " 

"Yet  what,  love?"     (Another  panic.) 

"Nothing,  but — ah,  he's  so  ki-ind  to  my  brother! 
And  his  cousin  Adolphe,"  she  whispered  as  they  moved 
on  down,  "I  don't  know,  but  I  fear  perchanze  he  don't 
like  his  cousin  Adolphe — his  cousin  Adolphe — on  the 
outside,  same  as  the  General,  rough — 't  is  a  wondrous 
how  his  cousin  Adolphe  is  fond  of  him!" 

Poor  Anna.  She  led  the  way  into  the  family  group 
actually  wheedled  into  the  belief  that  however  she  had 
blundered  with  her  lover,  with  Flora  she  had  been 

142 


"  'Tis  good-by,   Kincaid's  Battery" 


A  Castaway  Rose 

clever.  And  now  they  heard  the  only  true  account  of 
how  Captain  Beauregard  and  General  Steve  had  taken 
Fort  Sumter.  At  the  same  time  every  hearer  kept 
one  ear  alert  toward  the  great  open  windows.  Yet 
nothing  came  to  explain  that  Kincaid's  detention  up 
town  was  his  fond  cousin's  contriving,  and  Sumter's 
story  was  at  its  end  when  all  started  at  once  and  then 
subsided  with  relief  as  first  the  drums  and  then  the 
bugles  sounded — no  alarm,  but  only,  drowsily,  "taps," 
as  if  to  say  to  Callender  House  as  well  as  to  the  camp, 
"Go  to  slee-eep  .  .  .  Go  to  slee-eep  .  .  .  Go  to 
bed,  go  to  bed,  go  to  slee-eep  .  .  .  Go  to  slee-eep,  go 
to  slee-eep  .  .  .  Go  to  slee-ee-eep." 

XXIX 

A    CASTAWAY    ROSE 

GONE  to  sleep  the  camp  except  its  sentinels,  and  all 
Callender  House  save  one  soul.  Not  Miranda,  not  the 
Mandevilles,  nor  Madame  Valcour,  nor  any  domestic. 
Flora  knew,  though  it  was  not  Flora.  In  her  slumbers 
she  knew. 

Two  of  the  morning.  Had  the  leader,  the  idol  of 
Kincaid's  Battery,  failed  in  his  endeavor?  Anna,  on 
her  bed,  half  disrobed,  but  sleepless  yet,  still  prayed  he 
might  not  succeed.  Just  this  one  time,  oh,  Lord!  this 
one  time!  With  Thee  are  not  all  things  possible? 
Canst  Thou  not  so  order  all  things  that  a  day  or  two's 
delay  of  Kincaid's  Battery  need  work  no  evil  to  the 
Cause  nor  any  such  rending  to  any  heart  as  must  be 
hers  if  Kincaid's  Battery  should  go  to-night?  Softly 


Kincaid's  Battery 

the  stair  clock  boomed  three.  She  lifted  her  head  and 
for  a  full  three  minutes  harkened  toward  the  camp. 
Still  no  sound  there,  thank  God !  She  turned  upon  her 
pillow. 

But — what !  Could  that  be  the  clock  again,  and  had 
she  slumbered?  "Three,  four,"  murmured  the  clock. 
She  slipped  from  her  bed  and  stole  to  the  window.  Just 
above  the  low,  dim  parapet,  without  a  twinkle,  the 
morning  star  shone  large,  its  slender,  mile-long  radiance 
shimmering  on  the  gliding  river.  In  all  the  scented 
landscape  was  yet  no  first  stir  of  dawn,  but  only  clear 
ness  enough  to  show  the  outlines  of  the  camp  ground. 
She  stared.  She  stared  again!  Not  a  tent  was  stand 
ing.  Oh!  and  oh!  through  what  bugling,  what  rolling 
of  drums  and  noise  of  hoofs,  wheels,  and  riders  had  she 
lain  oblivious  at  last?  None,  really;  by  order  of  the 
commanding  general — on  a  private  suggestion  of  Irby's, 
please  notice,  that  the  practice  would  be  of  value — 
camp  had  been  struck  in  silence.  But  to  her  the  sole 
fact  in  reach  was  that  all  its  life  was  gone ! 

Sole  fact  ?  Gone  ?  All  gone  ?  What  was  this  long 
band  of  darkness  where  the  gray  road  should  be,  in  the 
dull  shadow  of  the  levee?  Oh,  God  of  mercy,  it  was 
the  column !  the  whole  of  Kincaid's  Battery,  in  the  saddle 
and  on  the  chests,  waiting  for  the  word  to  march !  Ah, 
thou  ladies'  man !  Thus  to  steal  away !  Is  this  your 
profound — abiding — consuming  love?  The  whisper 
was  only  in  her  heart,  but  it  had  almost  reached  her  lips, 
when  she  caught  her  breath,  her  whole  form  in  a  tremor. 
She  clenched  the  window-frame,  she  clasped  her  heaving 
side. 

For  as  though  in  reply,  approaching  from  behind  the 
144 


A  Castaway  Rose 

house  as  if  already  the  producer  had  nearly  made  its 
circuit,  there  sounded  close  under  the  balustrade  the 
walking  of  a  horse.  God  grant  no  other  ear  had  noted 
it!  Now  just  beneath  the  window  it  ceased.  Hilary 
Kincaid!  She  could  not  see,  but  as  sure  as  sight  she 
knew.  Her  warrior,  her  knight,  her  emperor  now  at 
last,  utterly  and  forever,  she  his,  he  hers,  yet  the  last 
moment  of  opportunity  flitting  by  and  she  here  helpless 
to  speak  the  one  word  of  surrender  and  possession. 
Again  she  shrank  and  trembled.  Something  had 
dropped  in  at  the  window.  There  it  lay,  small  and 
dark,  on  the  floor.  She  snatched  it  up.  Its  scant  tie 
of  ribbon,  her  touch  told  her,  was  a  bit  of  the  one  she 
had  that  other  time  thrown  down  to  him,  and  the  thing 
it  tied  and  that  looked  so  black  in  the  dusk  was  a  red, 
red  rose. 

She  pressed  it  to  her  lips.  With  quaking  fingers 
that  only  tangled  the  true-love  knot  and  bled  on  the 
thorns,  she  stripped  the  ribbon  off  and  lifted  a  hand 
high  to  cast  it  forth,  but  smote  the  sash  and  dropped 
the  emblem  at  her  own  feet.  In  pain  and  fear  she 
caught  it  up,  straightened,  and  glanced  to  her  door,  the 
knot  in  one  hand,  the  rose  in  the  other,  and  her  lips 
apart.  For  at  some  unknown  moment  the  door  had 
opened,  and  in  it  stood  Flora  Valcour. 

Furtively  into  a  corner  fluttered  rose  and  ribbon 
while  the  emptied  hands  extended  a  counterfeit  wel 
come  and  beckoned  the  visitor's  aid  to  close  the  win 
dow.  As  the  broad  sash  came  down,  Anna's  heart,  in 
final  despair,  sunk  like  lead,  or  like  the  despairing  heart 
of  her  disowned  lover  in  the  garden,  Flora's  heart  the 
meantime  rising  like  a  recovered  kite.  They  moved 

145 


KincaicTs  Battery 

from  the  window  with  their  four  hands  joined,  the  de 
jected  girl  dissembling  elation,  the  elated  one  dejection. 

"I  don't  see,"  twittered  Anna,  "how  I  should  have 
closed  it!  How  chilly  it  gets  toward " 

"Ah!"  tremulously  assented  the  subtler  one.  "And 
such  a  dream!  I  was  oblige'  to  escape  to  you  I" 

"And  did  just  right!"  whispered  and  beamed  poor 
Anna.  "What  did  you  dream,  dear?" 

"I  dremp  the  battery  was  going!  and  going  to  a  battle! 
and  with  the  res'  my  brother!  And  now " 

"Now  it's  but  a  dream!"  said  her  comforter. 

"Anna!"  the  dreamer  flashed  a  joy  that  seemed 
almost  fierce.  She  fondly  pressed  the  hands  she  held 
and  drew  their  owner  toward  the  ill-used  rose.  "Dear 
est,  behold  mel  a  thief,  yet  innocent!" 

Anna  smiled  fondly,  but  her  heart  had  stopped,  her 
feet  moved  haltingly.  A  mask  of  self-censure  poorly 
veiled  Flora's  joy,  yet  such  as  it  was  it  was  needed.  Up 
from  the  garden,  barely  audible  to  ears  straining  for  it, 
yet  surging  through  those  two  minds  like  a  stifling  smoke, 
sounded  the  tread  of  the  departing  horseman. 

"Yes,"  murmured  Anna,  hoping  to  drown  the  foot 
fall,  and  with  a  double  meaning  though  with  sincere 
tenderness,  "you  are  stealing  now,  not  meaning  to." 

"Now?"  whispered  the  other,  "how  can  that  be?" 
though  she  knew.  "Ah,  if  I  could  steal  now  your 
heart  al-sol  But  I've  stolen,  I  fear,  only — your — con- 
fidenze!"  Between  the  words  she  loosed  one  hand, 
stooped  and  lifted  the  flower.  Each  tried  to  press  it  to 
the  other's  bosom,  but  it  was  Anna  who  yielded. 

"I'd  make  you  take  it,"  she  protested  as  Flora  pinned 
it  on,  "if  I  hadn't  thrown  it  away." 

146 


A  Castaway  Rose 

"Dearest,"  cooed  the  other,  "that  would  make  me  a 
thief  ag-ain,  and  this  time  guilty." 

"Can't  I  give  a  castaway  rose  to  whom  I  please?" 

"Not  this  one.  Ah,  sweet,  a  thousand  thousand 
pardon!" — the  speaker  bent  to  her  hearer's  ear — "I 
saw  you  when  you  kiss'  it — and  before." 

Anna's  face  went  into  her  hands,  and  face  and  hands 
to  Flora's  shoulder;  but  in  the  next  breath  she  clutched 
the  shoulder  and  threw  up  her  head,  while  the  far  strain 
of  a  bugle  faintly  called,  "Head  of  column  to  the 
right." 

The  cadence  died.  "Floral  your  dream  is  true  and 
that's  the  battery!  It's  going,  Flora.  It's  gone  I  Your 
brother's  gone!  Your  brother,  Flora,  your  brother! 
Charlie!  he's  gone."  So  crying  Anna  sprang  to  the 
window  and  with  unconscious  ease  threw  it  up. 

The  pair  stood  in  it.  With  a  bound  like  the  girl's 
own,  clear  day  had  come.  Palely  the  river  purpled  and 
silvered.  No  sound  was  anywhere,  no  human  sign  on 
vacant  camp  ground,  levee,  or  highroad.  "Ah!" — 
Flora  made  a  well  pretended  gesture  of  discovery  and 
distress — "'tis  true!  That  bugl'  muz'  have  meant  us 
good-by." 

"Oh,  then  it  was  cruel  I"  exclaimed  Anna.  "To 
you,  dear,  cruel  to  you  to  steal  off  in  that  way.  Run! 
dress  for  the  carriage!" 

Flora  played  at  hesitation:  "Ah,  love,  if  perchanze 
that  bugl'  was  to  call  you?" 

"My  dear!  how  could  even  he — the 'ladies'  man,'  ha, 
ha! — imagine  any  true  woman  would  come  to  the  call 
of  a  bugle?  Go!  while  I  order  the  carriage." 

They  had  left  the  window.     The  hostess  lifted  her 

147 


Kincaid's  Battery 

hand  toward  a  bell-cord  but  the  visitor  stayed  it,  ab 
sently  staring  while  letting  herself  be  pressed  toward  the 
door,  thrilled  with  a  longing  as  wild  as  Anna's  and  for 
the  same  sight,  yet  cunningly  pondering.  Nay,  wait 
ing,  rather,  on  instinct,  which  the  next  instant  told  her 
that  Anna  would  inevitably  go  herself,  no  matter  who 
stayed. 

"You'll  come  al-long  too?"  she  pleadingly  asked. 

"No,  dear,  I  cannot!  Your  grandmother  will,  of 
course,  and  Miranda."  The  bell-cord  was  pulled. 

"Anna,  you  must  go,  else  me,  I  will  not!" 

"Ah,  how  can  I?  Dear,  dear,  you're  wasting  such 
golden  moments!  Well,  I'll  go  with  you!  Only  make 
haste  while  I  call  the  others — stop!"  Their  arms  fell 
lightly  about  each  other's  neck.  "You'll  never  tell  on 
me  ?  ...  Not  even  to  Miranda  ?  .  .  .  Nor  h-his — 
his  uncle?  .  .  .  Nor" — the  petitioner  pressed  closer 
with  brightening  eyes — "nor  his — cousin?" 

Softly  Flora's  face  went  into  her  hands,  and  face  and 
hands  to  Anna's  shoulder,  as  neat  a  reduplication  as 
ever  was.  But  suddenly  there  were  hoof-beats  again. 
Yes,  coming  at  an  easy  gallop.  Now  they  trotted 
through  the  front  gate.  The  eyes  of  the  two  stared. 
"A  courier,"  whispered  Anna,  "to  Captain  Mande- 
ville!"  though  all  her  soul  hoped  differently. 

Only  a  courier  it  was.  So  said  the  maid  who  came 
in  reply  to  the  late  ring,  but  received  no  command. 
The  two  girls,  shut  in  together,  Anna  losing  moments 
more  golden  than  ever,  heard  the  rider  at  the  veranda 
steps  accost  the  old  coachman  and  so  soon  after  greet 
Mandeville  that  it  was  plain  the  captain  had  already 
been  up  and  dressing. 

148 


A  Castaway  Rose 

"It's  Charlie!"  breathed  Anna,  and  Flora  nodded. 

Now  Charlie  trotted  off  again,  and  now  galloped 
beyond  hearing,  while  Mandeville's  booted  tread  re 
ascended  to  his  wife's  room.  And  now  came  Con 
stance  :  "  Nan,  where  on  earth  is  Fl —  ?  Oh,  of  course ! 
News,  Nan!  Good  news,  Flora!  The  battery,  you 
know ?" 

"Yes,"  said  Anna,  with  her  dryest  smile,  "it's 
sneaked  off  in  the  dark." 

"Nan,  you're  mean!  It's  marching  up-town  now, 
Flora.  At  least  the  guns  and  caissons  are,  so  as  to  be 
got  onto  the  train  at  once.  And  oh,  girls,  those  poor, 
dear  boys !  the  train — from  end  to  end  it's  to  be  nothing 
but  a  freight  train!" 

"Hoh!"  laughed  the  heartless  Anna,  "that's  better 
than  staying  here." 

The  sister  put  out  her  chin  and  turned  again  to  Flora. 
"But  just  now,"  she  said,  "the  main  command  are  to 
wait  and  rest  in  Congo  Square,  and  about  ten  o'clock 
they're  to  be  joined  by  all  the  companies  of  the  Chas 
seurs  that  haven't  gone  to  Pensacola  and  by  the  whole 
regiment  of  the  Orleans  Guards,  as  an  escort  of  honor, 
and  march  in  that  way  to  the  depot,  led  by  General 
Brodnax  and  his  staff — and  Steve !  And  every  one  who 
wants  to  bid  them  good-by  must  do  it  there.  Of  course 
there'll  be  a  perfect  jam,  and  so  Miranda's  ordering 
breakfast  at  seven  and  the  carriage  at  eight,  and  Steve 
— he  didn't  tell  even  me  last  night  because — "  Her 
words  stuck  in  her  throat,  her  tears  glistened,  she 
gnawed  her  lips.  Anna  laid  tender  hands  on  her. 

"Why,  what,  Connie,  dear?" 

«St— Ste— Steve " 

149 


KincaicTs  Battery 

"Is  Steve  going  with  them  to  Virginia?" 

The  face  of  Constance  went  into  her  hands,  and  face 

and  hands  to  Anna's  shoulder.     Meditatively  smiling, 

Flora  slipped  away  to  dress. 


XXX 

GOOD-BY,  KINCAID'S  BATTERY 

AT  one  end  of  a  St.  Charles  Hotel  parlor  a  group  of 
natty  officers  stood  lightly  chatting  while  they  covertly 
listened.  At  the  other  end,  with  Irby  and  Mandeville 
at  his  two  elbows,  General  Brodnax  conversed  with 
Kincaid  and  Bartleson,  the  weather-faded  red  and  gray 
of  whose  uniforms  showed  in  odd  contrast  to  the  smart 
ness  all  about  them. 

Now  he  gave  their  words  a  frowning  attention,  and 
now  answered  abruptly:  "Humph!  That  looks  tre 
mendously  modest  in  you,  gentlemen, — what?  .  .  . 
Well,  then,  in  your  whole  command  if  it's  their  notion. 
But  it's  vanity  at  last,  sirs,  pure  vanity.  Kincaid's 
Battery  'doesn't  want  to  parade  its  dinginess  till  it's 
done  something' — pure  vanity!  *  Shortest  way' — non 
sense'  The  shortest  way  to  the  train  isn't  the  point! 
The  point  is  to  make  so  inspiring  a  show  of  you  as  to 
shame  the  damned  stay-at-homes!" 

"You'll  par-ade,"  broke  in  the  flaming  Mandeville. 
"worse*  dress  than  presently,  when  you  rit-urn  con 
queror'!"  But  that  wearied  the  General  more. 

"  Oh,  hell,"  he  mumbled.  "  Captain  Kincaid,  eh—  " 
He  led  that  officer  alone  to  a  window  and  spoke  low: 
"About  my  girl,  Hilary, — and  me.  I'd  like  to  decide 


Good-by,  KincaicTs  Battery 

that  matter  before  you  show  your  heels.  You,  eh, — 
default,  I  suppose  ?" 

"No,  uncle,  she  does  that.  I  do  only  the  hopeless 
loving." 

"The  wha-at?  Great  Lord!  You  don't  tell  me 
you ?" 

"Yes,  I  caved  in  last  night;  told  her  I  loved  her. 
Oh,  I  didn't  do  it  just  in  this  ashes-of-roses  tone  of 
voice,  but" — the  nephew  smiled — the  General  scowled 
— "you  should  have  seen  me,  uncle.  You'd  have 
thought  it  was  Mandeville.  I  made  a  gorgeous  botch 
of  it. 

"You  don't  mean  she ?" 

"Yes,  sir,  adjourned  me  sine  die.  Oh,  it's  no  use  to 
look  at  me."  He  laughed.  "The  calf's  run  over  me. 
My  fat's  in  the  fire." 

The  General  softly  swore  and  continued  his  gaze. 
"I  believe,"  he  slowly  said,  "that's  why  you  wanted  to 
slink  out  of  town  the  back  way." 

"Oh,  no,  it's  not.  Or  at  least — well,  anyhow, 
uncle,  now  you  can  decide  in  favor  of  Adolphe." 

The  uncle  swore  so  audibly  that  the  staff  heard  and 
exchanged  smiles:  "I  neither  can  nor  will  decide — 
for  either  of  you — yet!  You  understand?  I  don't  do 
it.  Go,  bring  your  battery." 

The  city  was  taken  by  surprise.  Congo  Square  was 
void  of  soldiers  before  half  Canal  street's  new  red- 
white-and-red  bunting  could  be  thrown  to  the  air.  In 
column  of  fours — escort  leading  and  the  giant  in  the 
bearskin  hat  leading  it — they  came  up  Rampart  street. 
On  their  right  hardly  did  time  suffice  for  boys  to  climb 
the  trees  that  in  four  rows  shaded  its  noisome  canal; 


Kincaid's  Battery 

on  their  left  not  a  second  too  many  was  there  for  the 
people  to  crowd  the  doorsteps,  fill  windows  and  garden 
gates,  line  the  banquettes  and  silently  gather  breath  and 
ardor  while  the  escort  moved  by,  before  the  moment 
was  come  in  which  to  cheer  and  cheer  and  cheer,  as 
with  a  hundred  flashing  sabres  at  shoulder  the  dis 
mounted,  heavy-knapsacked,  camp-worn  battery,  Kin 
caid's  Battery — you  could  read  the  name  on  the  flag— 
Kincaid's  Battery!  came  and  came  and  passed.  In 
Canal  street  and  in  St.  Charles  there  showed  a  fierce 
ness  of  pain  in  the  cheers,  and  the  march  was  by 
platoons.  At  the  hotel  General  Brodnax  and  staff 
joined  and  led  it — up  St.  Charles,  around  Tivoli  Circle, 
and  so  at  last  into  Calliope  street. 

Meantime  far  away  and  sadly  belated,  with  the  Val- 
cours  cunningly  to  blame  and  their  confiding  hostesses 
generously  making  light  of  it,  up  Love  street  hurried 
the  Callenders'  carriage.  Up  the  way  of  Love  and 
athwart  the  oddest  tangle  of  streets  in  New  Orleans, — 
Frenchmen  and  Casacalvo,  Greatmen,  History,  Victory, 
Peace,  Arts,  Poet,  Music,  Bagatelle,  Craps,  and  Mys 
terious — across  Elysian  Fields  not  too  Elysian,  past 
the  green,  high-fenced  gardens  of  Esplanade  and 
Rampart  flecked  red-white-and-red  with  the  oleander, 
the  magnolia,  and  the  rose,  spun  the  wheels,  spanked 
the  high-trotters.  The  sun  was  high  and  hot,  shadows 
were  scant  and  sharp,  here  a  fence  and  there  a  wall 
were  as  blinding  white  as  the  towering  fair-weather 
clouds,  gowns  were  gauze  and  the  parasols  were  six, 
for  up  beside  the  old  coachman  sat  Victorine.  She  it 
was  who  first  saw  that  Congo  Square  was  empty  and 
then  that  the  crowds  were  gone  from  Canal  street.  It 


Good-by,  Kincaid's  Battery 

was  she  who  first  suggested  Dryads  street  for  a  short 
cut  and  at  Triton  Walk  was  first  to  hear,  on  before,  the 
music, — ah,  those  horn-bursting  Dutchmen!  could  they 
never,  never  hit  it  right  ? 

"When  other  lips  and  other  hearts 
Their  tale  of  love  shall  tell " 

and  it  was  she  who,  as  they  crossed  Calliope  street,  first 
espied  the  rear  of  the  procession,  in  column  of  fours 
again,  it  was  she  who  flashed  tears  of  joy  as  they 
whirled  into  Erato  street  to  overtake  the  van  and  she 
was  first  to  alight  at  the  station. 

The  General  and  his  staff  were  just  reaching  it.  Far 
down  behind  them  shone  the  armed  host.  The  march 
ceased,  the  music — "then  you'll  rememb'" — broke  off 
short.  The  column  rested.  "Mon  Dieu!"  said  even 
the  Orleans  Guards,  "quel  chaleur!  Is  it  not  a  terrib', 
thad  sun!"  Hundreds  of  their  blue  kepis,  hundreds  of 
gray  shakos  in  the  Confederate  Guards,  were  lifted  to 
wipe  streaming  necks  and  throats,  while  away  down 
beyond  our  ladies'  ken  all  the  drummers  of  the  double 
escort,  forty  by  count,  silently  came  back  and  moved 
in  between  the  battery  and  its  band  to  make  the  last 
music  the  very  bravest.  Was  that  Kincaid,  the  crowd 
asked,  one  of  another;  he  of  the  thick  black  locks,  tired 
cheek  and  brow,  and  eyes  that  danced  now  as  he  smiled 
and  talked?  "Phew!  me,  I  shou'n'  love  to  be  tall  like 
that,  going  to  be  shot  at,  no!  ha,  ha!  But  thad's  no 
wonder  they  are  call'  the  ladies'  man  batt'rie!" 

"Hah!  they  are  not  call'  so  because  him,  but  because 
themse'v's!  Every  one  he  is  that,  and  they  did  n'  got 
the  name  in  Circus  street  neither,  ha,  ha! — although — 

153 


Kincaid's  Battery 

Hello,  Chahlie  Valcour.  Good-by,  Chahlie.  Don't 
ged  shoot  in  the  back — ha,  ha! " 

A  command !  How  eternally  different  from  the  voice 
of  prattle.  The  crowd  huddled  back  to  either  side 
walk,  forced  by  the  opening  lines  of  the  escort  backed 
against  it,  till  the  long,  shelled  wagon- way  gleamed 
white  and  bare.  Oh,  Heaven!  oh,  home!  oh,  love! 
oh,  war!  For  hundreds,  hundreds — beat  Anna's  heart 
— the  awful  hour  had  come,  had  come!  She  and  her 
five  companions  could  see  clear  down  both  bayonet- 
crested  living  walls — blue  half  the  sun-tortured  way, 
gray  the  other  half — to  where  in  red  kepis  and  with 
shimmering  sabres,  behind  their  tall  captain,  stretched 
the  dense  platoons  and  came  and  came,  to  the  crash  of 
horns,  the  boys,  the  boys,  the  dear,  dear  boys  who  with 
him,  with  him  must  go,  must  go! 

"Don't  cry,  Connie  dear,"  she  whispered,  though 
stubborn  drops  were  salting  her  own  lips,  "it  will  make 
it  harder  for  Steve." 

"Harder!"  moaned  the  doting  bride,  "you  don't 
know  him!" 

"Oh,  let  any  woman  cry  who  can,"  laughed  Flora, 
"I  wish  I  could!"  and  verily  spoke  the  truth.  Anna 
meltingly  pressed  her  hand  but  gave  her  no  glance. 
All  eyes,  dry  or  wet,  were  fixed  on  the  nearing  mass,  all 
ears  drank  the  rising  peal  and  roar  of  its  horns  and 
drums.  How  superbly  rigorous  its  single,  two-hun 
dred-footed  step.  With  what  splendid  rigidity  the 
escorts'  burnished  lines  walled  in  its  oncome. 

But  suddenly  there  was  a  change.  Whether  it 
began  in  the  music,  which  turned  into  a  tune  every 
Tom,  Dick,  and  Harry  now  had  by  heart,  or  whether 

154 


Good-by,  KincaicTs  Battery 

a  moment  before  among  the  blue-caps  or  gray-shakos, 
neither  Anna  nor  the  crowd  could  tell.  Some  father 
in  those  side  ranks  lawlessly  cried  out  to  his  red-capped 
boy  as  the  passing  lad  brushed  close  against  him, 
" Good-by,  my  son!"  and  as  the  son  gave  him  only  a 
sidelong  glance  he  seized  and  shook  the  sabre  arm, 
and  all  that  long,  bristling  lane  of  bayonets  went  out 
of  plumb,  out  of  shape  and  order,  and  a  thousand 
brass-buttoned  throats  shouted  good-by  and  hurrah. 
Shakos  waved,  shoulders  were  snatched  and  hugged, 
blue  kepis  and  red  were  knocked  awry,  beards  were 
kissed  and  mad  tears  let  flow.  And  still,  with  a  rigor 
the  superbest  yet  because  the  new  tune  was  so  perfect 
to  march  by,  fell  the  unshaken  tread  of  the  can 
noneers,  and  every  onlooker  laughed  and  wept  and 
cheered  as  the  brass  rent  out  to  the  deafening  drums, 
and  the  drums  roared  back  to  the  piercing  brass, — 

De  black-snake  love'  de  blackbird'  nes', 

De  baby  love'  his  mamy's  bres', 
An'  raggy-tag,  aw  spick-an'-span, 

De  ladies  loves  de  ladies'  man. 

I  loves  to  roll  my  eyes  to  de  ladies! 

I  loves  to  sympathize  wid  de  ladies! 

As  long  as  eveh  I  knows  sugah  f  om  san' 

I's  bound  to  be  a  ladies'  man. 

So  the  black-hatted  giant  with  the  silver  staff  strode 
into  the  wide  shed,  the  puffy-cheeked  band  reading 
their  music  and  feeling  for  foothold  as  they  followed, 
and  just  yonder  behind  them,  in  the  middle  of  the 
white  way,  untouched  by  all  those  fathers,  unhailed  by 
any  brother  of  his  own,  came  Hilary  Kincaid  with  all 
the  battery  at  his  neat  heels,  its  files  tightly  serried  but 

155 


Kincaid's  Battery 

its  platoons  in  open  order,  each  flashing  its  sabres  to  a 
" present"  on  nearing  the  General  and  back  to  a 
"carry"  when  he  was  passed,  and  then  lengthening 
into  column  of  files  to  enter  the  blessed  shade  of  the 
station. 

In  beside  them  surged  a  privileged  throng  of  near 
kin,  every  one  calling  over  every  one's  head,  "Good- 
by!"  "Good-byl"  "Here's  your  mother,  Johnnie!" 
and,  "Here's  your  wife,  Achille!"  Midmost  went  the 
Callenders,  the  Valcours,  and  Victorine,  willy-nilly, 
topsy-turvy,  swept  away,  smothering,  twisting,  laugh 
ing,  stumbling,  staggering,  yet  saved  alive  by  that 
man  of  the  moment  Mandeville,  until  half-way  down 
the  shed  and  the  long  box-car  train  they  brought  up 
on  a  pile  of  ordnance  stores  and  clung  like  drift  in  a 
flood.  And  at  every  twist  and  stagger  Anna  said  in 
her  heart  a  speech  she  had, been  saying  over  and  over 
ever  since  the  start  from  Callender  House;  a  poor  com 
monplace  speech  that  must  be  spoken  though  she 
perished  for  shame  of  it;  that  must  be  darted  out  just 
at  the  right  last  instant  if  such  an  instant  Heaven  would 
only  send :  "I  take  back  what  I  said  last  night  and  I'm 
glad  you  spoke  as  you  did!" 

Here  now  the  moment  seemed  at  hand.  For  here 
was  the  officers'  box-car  and  here  with  sword  in  sheath 
Kincaid  also  had  stopped,  in  conference  with  the  con 
ductor,  while  his  lieutenants  marched  the  column  on, 
now  halted  it  along  the  train's  full  length,  now  faced  it 
against  the  open  cars  and  now  gave  final  command  to 
break  ranks.  In  comic  confusion  the  fellows  clambered 
aboard  stormed  by  their  friends'  fond  laughter  at  the 
awkwardness  of  loaded  knapsacks,  and  their  retorting 

156 


Good-by,  Kincaid's  Battery 

mirth  drowned  in  a  new  flood  of  good-bys  and  adieus, 
fresh  waving  of  hats  and  handkerchiefs,  and  made-over 
smiles  from  eyes  that  had  wept  themselves  dry.  The 
tear-dimmed  Victorine  called  gay  injunctions  to  her 
father,  the  undimmed  Flora  to  her  brother,  and  Anna 
laughed  and  laughed  and  waved  in  all  directions  save 
one.  There  Mandeville  had  joined  Kincaid  and  the 
conductor  and  amid  the  wide  downpour  and  swirl  of 
words  and  cries  was  debating  with  them  whether  it  were 
safer  to  leave  the  shed  slowly  or  swiftly;  and  there  every 
now  and  then  Anna's  glance  flitted  near  enough  for 
Hilary  to  have  caught  it  as  easily  as  did  Bartleson, 
Tracy,  every  lieutenant  and  sergeant  of  the  command, 
busy  as  they  were  warning  the  throng  back  from  the 
cars;  yet  by  him  it  was  never  caught. 

The  debate  had  ended.  He  gave  the  conductor  a 
dismissing  nod  that  sent  him,  with  a  signalling  hand 
thrown  high,  smartly  away  toward  the  locomotive. 
The  universal  clatter  and  flutter  redoubled.  The  bell 
was  sounding  and  Mandeville  was  hotly  shaking  hands 
with  Flora,  Miranda,  all.  The  train  stirred,  groaned, 
crept,  faltered,  crept  on — on — one's  brain  tingled  to  the 
cheers,  and  women  were  crying  again. 

Kincaid's  eyes  ran  far  and  near  in  final  summing  up. 
The  reluctant  train  gave  a  dogged  joggle  and  jerk, 
hung  back,  dragged  on,  moved  a  trifle  quicker;  and 
still  the  only  proof  that  he  knew  she  was  here — here 
within  three  steps  of  him — was  the  careful  failure  of 
those  eyes  ever  to  light  on  her.  Oh,  heart,  heart,  heart ! 
would  it  be  so  to  the  very  end  and  vanishment  of  all  ? 

"I  take  back — I  take — "  was  there  going  to  be  no 
chance  to  begin  it?  Was  he  grief  blind?  or  was  he 

157 


KincaicTs  Battery 

scorn  blind?  No  matter!  what  she  had  sown  she 
would  reap  if  she  had  to  do  it  under  the  very  thunder 
cloud  of  his  frown.  All  or  any,  the  blame  of  estrange 
ment  should  be  his,  not  hers!  Oh,  Connie,  Connie! 
Mandeville  had  clutched  Constance  and  was  kissing  her 
on  lips  and  head  and  cheeks.  He  wheeled,  caught  a 
hand  from  the  nearest  car,  and  sprang  in.  Kincaid 
stood  alone.  The  conductor  made  him  an  eager  sign. 
The  wheels  of  the  train  clicked  briskly.  He  glanced 
up  and  down  it,  then  sprang  to  Miranda,  seized  her 
hand,  cried  "Good-by!"  snatched  Madame's,  Flora's, 
Victorine's,  Connie's, — "  Good-by — Good-by ! " — and 
came  to  Anna. 

And  did  she  instantly  begin,  "I  take ?"  Not  at 

all !  She  gave  her  hand,  both  hands,  but  her  lips  stood 
helplessly  apart.  Flora,  Madame,  Victorine,  Con 
stance,  Miranda,  Charlie  from  a  car's  top,  the  three 
lieutenants,  the  battery's  whole  hundred,  saw  Hilary's 
gaze  pour  into  hers,  hers  into  his.  Only  the  eyes  of 
the  tumultuous  crowd  still  followed  the  train  and  its 
living  freight.  A  woman  darted  to  a  car's  open  door 
and  gleaned  one  last  wild  kiss.  Two,  ten,  twenty 
others,  while  the  conductor  ran  waving,  ordering, 
thrusting  them  away,  repeated  the  splendid  theft,  and 
who  last  of  all  and  with  a  double  booty  but  Constance ! 
Anna  beheld  the  action,  though  with  eyes  still  captive. 
With  captive  eyes,  and  with  lips  now  shut  and  now 
apart  again  as  she  vainly  strove  for  speech,  she  saw 
still  plainer  his  speech  fail  also.  His  hands  tightened 
on  hers,  hers  in  his. 

" Good-by!"  they  cried  together  and  were  dumb 
again;  but  in  their  mutual  gaze — more  vehement  than 

158 


Good-by,  Kincaid's  Battery 

their  voices  joined — louder  than  all  the  din  about  them 
— confession  so  answered  worship  that  he  snatched 
her  to  his  breast ;  yet  when  he  dared  bend  to  lay  a  kiss 
upon  her  brow  he  failed  once  more,  for  she  leaped  and 
caught  it  on  her  lips. 

Dishevelled,  liberated,  and  burning  with  blushes,  she 
watched  the  end  of  the  train  shrink  away.  On  its  last 
iron  ladder  the  conductor  swung  aside  to  make  room 
for  Kincaid's  stalwart  spring.  So!  It  gained  one 
handhold,  one  foothold.  But  the  foot  slipped,  the 
soldier's  cap  tumbled  to  the  ground,  and  every  on 
looker  drew  a  gasp.  No,  the  conductor  held  him,  and 
erect  and  secure,  with  bare  locks  ruffling  in  the  wind 
of  the  train,  he  looked  back,  waved,  and  so  passed  from 
sight. 

Archly,  in  fond  Spanish,  "How  do  you  feel  now?" 
asked  Madame  of  her  scintillant  granddaughter  as  with 
their  friends  and  the  dissolving  throng  they  moved  to 
the  carriage;  and  in  the  same  tongue  Flora,  with  a 
caressing  smile,  rejoined,  "I  feel  like  swinging  you 
round  by  the  hair." 

Anna,  inwardly  frantic,  chattered  and  laughed.  "I 
don't  know  what  possessed  me!"  she  cried. 

But  Constance  was  all  earnestness:  "Nan,  you  did 
it  for  the  Cause — the  flag — the  battery — anything  but 
him  personally.  He  knows  it.  Everybody  saw  that. 
Its  very  publicity " 

"Yes?"  soothingly  interposed  Madame,  "'t  was  a 
so  verrie  pewblic  that " 

"Why,  Flora,"  continued  the  well-meaning  sister, 
"Steve  says  when  he  came  back  into  Charleston  from 
Fort  Sumter  the  ladies " 

159 


KincaicTs  Battery 

"Of  course!"  said  Flora,  sparkling  afresh.  "Even 
Steve  understands  that,  grandma."  Her  foot  was  on  a 
step  of  the  carriage.  A  child  plucked  her  flowing 
sleeve : 

"Misses!  Mom-a  say'" — he  pressed  into  her  grasp 
something  made  of  broadcloth,  very  red  and  golden — 
"here  yo'  husband's  cap." 


XXXI 

VIRGINIA    GIRLS    AND    LOUISIANA    BOYS 

THANKS  are  due  to  Mr.  Richard  Thorndyke  Smith 
for  the  loan  of  his  copy  of  a  slender  and  now  extremely 
rare  work  which  at  this  moment  lies  before  me.  "A 
History  of  Kincaid's  Battery,"  it  is  called,  "From  Its 
Origin  to  the  Present  Day,"  although  it  runs  only  to 
February,  '62,  and  was  printed  (so  well  printed,  on 
such  flimsy,  coarse  paper)  just  before  the  dreadful 
days  of  Shiloh  and  the  fall  of  New  Orleans. 

Let  us  never  paint  war  too  fair;  but  this  small 
volume  tells  of  little  beyond  the  gold-laced  year  of 
'  Sixty-one,  nor  of  much  beyond  Virginia,  even  over 
whose  later  war-years  the  color  effects  of  reminiscence 
show  blue  and  green  and  sunlit  despite  all  the  scarlet 
of  carnage,  the  black  and  crimson  of  burning,  and  the 
grim  hues  of  sickness,  squalor,  and  semi-starvation; 
show  green  and  blue  in  the  sunlight  of  victory,  con 
trasted  with  those  of  the  states  west  and  south  of  her 

It  tells — this  book  compiled  largely  from  correspond 
ence  of  persons  well  known  to  you  and  me — of  the 

160 


Virginia  Girls  and  Louisiana  Boys 

first  "eight-days'  crawl"  that  conveyed  the  chaffing, 
chafing  command  up  through  Mississippi,  across  East 
Tennessee  into  south-east  Virginia  and  so  on  through 
Lynchburg  to  lovely  Richmond;  tells  how  never  a 
house  was  passed  in  town  or  country  but  handkerchiefs, 
neckerchiefs,  snatched-off  sunbonnets,  and  Confederate 
flags  wafted  them  on.  It  tells  of  the  uncounted  rail 
way  stations  where  swarmed  the  girls  in  white  muslin 
aprons  and  red-white-and-red  bows,  who  waved  them 
in  as  they  came,  and  unconsciously  squinted  and  made 
faces  at  them  in  the  intense  sunlight.  It  tells  how  the 
maidens  gave  them  dainties  and  sweet  glances,  and 
boutonnieres  of  tuberoses  and  violets,  and  bloodthirsty 
adjurations,  and  blarney  for  blarney;  gave  them  seven 
wild  well-believed  rumors  for  as  many  impromptu 
canards,  and  in  their  soft  plantation  drawl  asked  which 
was  the  one  paramount  "  ladies'  man,"  and  were  as 
sured  by  every  lad  of  the  hundred  that  it  was  himself. 
It  tells  how,  having  heard  in  advance  that  the  more 
authentic  one  was  black-haired,  handsome,  and  over- 
towering,  they  singled  out  the  drum-major,  were  set 
right  only  by  the  roaring  laughter,  and  huddled  back 
ward  like  caged  quails  from  Kincaid's  brazen  smile, 
yet  waved  again  as  the  train  finally  jogged  on  with 
the  band  playing  from  the  roof  of  the  rear  car, — 

"I'd  offer  thee  this  hand  of  mine 
If  I  could  love  thee  less!" 

To  Anna  that  part  seemed  not  so  killingly  funny  or 
so  very  interesting,  but  she  was  not  one  of  the  book's 
editors. 

Two  or  three  pages  told  of  a  week  in  camp  just  out- 
161 


Kincaid's  Battery 

side  the  Virginian  capital,  where  by  day,  by  night,  on  its 
rocky  bed  sang  James  river;  of  the  business  quarter 
noisy  with  army  wagons — "rattling  o'er  the  stony 
street,"  says  the  page;  of  colonels,  generals,  and  states 
men  by  name — Hampton,  Wigfall,  the  fiery  Toombs, 
the  knightly  Lee,  the  wise  Lamar;  of  such  and  such 
headquarters,  of  sentinelled  warehouses,  glowing  iron 
works,  galloping  aides-de-camp  and  couriers  and  arriv 
ing  and  departing  columns,  some  as  trig  (almost)  as 
Kincaid's  Battery,  with  their  black  servants  following 
in  grotesque  herds  along  the  sidewalks;  and  some 
rudely  accoutred,  shaggy,  staring,  dust-begrimed,  in 
baggy  butternut  jeans,  bearing  flint-lock  muskets  and 
trudging  round-shouldered  after  fifes  and  drums  that 
squealed  and  boomed  out  the  strains  of  their  forgotten 
ancestors:  "The  Campbells  are  coming,"  "Johnnie 
was  a  piper's  son,"  or — 

"My  heart  is  ever  turning  back 
To  the  girl  I  left  behind  me." 

"You  should  have  seen  the  girls,"  laughs  the  book. 

But  there  were  girls  not  of  the  mountains  or  sand 
hills,  whom  also  you  should  have  seen,  at  battery 
manoeuvres  or  in  the  tulip-tree  and  maple  shade  of 
proud  Franklin  street,  or  in  its  rose-embowered  homes 
by  night;  girls  whom  few  could  dance  with,  or  even  sit 
long  beside  in  the  honeysuckle  vines  of  their  porticos, 
without  risk  of  acute  heart  trouble,  testifies  the  callow 
volume.  They  treated  every  lad  in  the  battery  like  a 
lieutenant,  and  the  "ladies'  man"  like  a  king.  You 
should  have  seen  him  waltz  them  or  in  quadrille  or 
cotillon  swing,  balance,  and  change  them,  their  eyes 

162 


Virginia  Girls  and  Louisiana  Boys 

brightening  and  feet  quickening  whenever  the  tune 
became — 

"  Ole  mahs'  love'  wine,  ole  mis'  love'  silk, 
De  piggies,  dey  loves  buttehmilk." 

Great  week!  tar-heel  camp-sentries  and  sand-hill 
street-patrols  mistaking  the  boys  for  officers,  saluting 
as  they  passed  and  always  getting  an  officer's  salute  in 
return!  Hilary  seen  every  day  with  men  high  and 
mighty,  who  were  as  quick  as  the  girls  to  make  merry 
with  him,  yet  always  in  their  merriment  seeming, 
he  and  they  alike,  exceptionally  upright,  downright, 
heartright,  and  busy.  It  kept  the  boys  straight  and 
strong. 

Close  after  came  a  month  or  so  on  the  Yorktown 
peninsula  with  that  master  of  strategic  ruse,  Magruder, 
but  solely  in  the  dreariest  hardships  of  war,  minus  all 
the  grander  sorts  that  yield  glory;  rains,  bad  food,  ill- 
chosen  camps,  freshets,  terrible  roads,  horses  sick  and 
raw-boned,  chills,  jaundice,  emaciation,  barely  an  occa 
sional  bang  at  the  enemy  on  reconnoissances  and  picket- 
ings,  and  marches  and  countermarches  through  blister 
ing  noons  and  skyless  nights,  with  men,  teams,  and 
guns  trying  to  see  which  could  stagger  the  worst,  along 
with  columns  of  infantry  mutinously  weary  of  forever 
fortifying  and  never  fighting.  Which  things  the  book 
bravely  makes  light  of,  Hilary  maintaining  that  the 
battery  boys  had  a  spirit  to  bear  them  better  than  most 
commands  did,  and  the  boys  reporting — not  to  boast 
the  special  kindness  everywhere  of  ladies  for  ladies* 
men — that  Hilary  himself,  oftenest  by  sunny,  but  some 
times  by  cyclonic,  treatment  of  commissaries,  quarter- 


Kincaid's  Battery 

masters,  surgeons,  and  citizens,  made  their  burdens 
trivial. 

So  we,  too,  lightly  pass  them.  After  all,  the  things 
most  important  here  are  matters  not  military  of  which 
the  book  does  not  tell.  Of  such  Victorine,  assistant 
editor  to  Miranda,  learned  richly  from  Anna — who 
merely  lent  letters — without  Anna  knowing  it.  Yet 
Flora  drew  little  from  Victorine,  who  was  as  Latin  as 
Flora,  truly  loved  Anna,  and  through  Charlie  was  a 
better  reader  of  Flora's  Latin  than  he  or  Flora  or  any 
one  suspected. 

For  a  moment  more,  however,  let  us  stay  with  the 
chronicle.  At  last,  when  all  was  suffered,  the  infuriated 
boys  missed  Ben  Butler  and  Big  Bethel!  One  day 
soon  after  that  engagement,  returning  through  Rich 
mond  in  new  uniforms — of  a  sort — with  scoured  faces, 
undusty  locks,  full  ranks,  fresh  horses,  new  harness 
and  shining  pieces,  and  with  every  gun-carriage,  limber, 
and  caisson  freshly  painted,  they  told  their  wrath  to 
Franklin  street  girls  while  drinking  their  dippers  of 
water.  Also — ' '  Good-by ! — 

'I'd  offer  thee  this  hand  of  mine '" 

They  were  bound  northward  to  join  their  own  Creole 
Beauregard  at  a  railway  junction  called . 


164 


Manassas 

XXXII 


FEMININELY  enough,  our  little  borrowed  book,  Mir 
anda's  and  Victorine's  compilation  of  letters  from  the 
front,  gives  no  more  than  a  few  lines  to  the  first  great 
battle  of  the  war. 

Fred  Greenleaf  was  one  of  its  wounded  prisoners. 
Hilary  cared  for  him  and  sought  his  exchange;  but 
owing  to  some  invisible  wire-pulling  by  Flora  Valcour, 
done  while  with  equal  privacy  she  showed  the  captive 
much  graciousness,  he  was  still  in  the  Parish  Prison, 
New  Orleans,  in  February,  '62,  when  the  book  was 
about  to  be  made,  though  recovered  of  wounds  and 
prison  ills  and  twice  or  thrice  out  on  his  parole,  after 
dusk  and  in  civilian's  dress,  at  Callender  House. 

The  Callenders  had  heard  the  combat's  proud  story 
often,  of  course,  not  only  from  battery  lads  bringing 
home  dead  comrades,  or  coming  to  get  well  of  their 
own  hurts,  or  never  to  get  well  of  them,  but  also  from 
gold-sleeved,  gray-breasted  new  suitors  of  Anna  (over 
staying  their  furloughs),  whom  she  kept  from  tenderer 
themes  by  sprightly  queries  that  never  tired  and  con 
stantly  brought  forth  what  seemed  totally  unsought 
mentions  of  the  battery.  And  she  had  gathered  the 
tale  from  Greenleaf  as  well.  Constance,  to  scandalized 
intimates,  marvelled  at  her  sister's  tolerance  of  his 
outrageous  version;  but  Miranda  remembered  how 
easy  it  is  to  bear  with  patience  (on  any  matter  but  one) 
a  rejected  lover  who  has  remained  faithful,  and  Flora, 
to  grandma,  smiled  contentedly. 

165  ' 


Kincaid's  Battery 

Anna's  own  private  version  (sum  of  all),  though  never 
written  even  in  her  diary,  was  illustrated,  mind-pictured. 
Into  her  reveries  had  gradually  come  a  tableau  of  the  great 
field.  Inaccurate  it  may  have  been,  incomplete,  even  gro 
tesquely  unfair;  but  to  her  it  was  at  least  clear.  Here — 
through  the  middle  of  her  blue-skied,  pensive  contem 
plation,  so  to  speak — flowed  Bull  Run.  High  above  it, 
circling  in  eagle  majesty  under  still,  white  clouds,  the 
hungry  buzzard,  vainly  as  yet,  scanned  the  green  acres 
of  meadow  and  wood  merry  with  the  lark,  the  thrush, 
the  cardinal.  Here  she  discerned  the  untried  gray 
brigades — atom-small  on  nature's  face,  but  with  Ewell, 
Early,  Longstreet,  and  other  such  to  lead  them — holding 
the  frequent  fords,  from  Union  Mills  up  to  Lewis's. 
Here  near  Mitchell's,  on  a  lonesome  roadside,  stood 
Kincaid's  Battery,  fated  there  to  stay  for  hours  yet,  in 
hateful  idleness  and  a  fierce  July  sun,  watching  white 
smoke-lines  of  crackling  infantry  multiply  in  the  land 
scape  or  bursting  shells  make  white  smoke-rings  in  the 
bright  air,  and  to  listen  helplessly  to  the  boom,  hurtle 
and  boom  of  other  artilleries  and  the  far  away  cheering 
and  counter-cheering  of  friend  and  fee.  Yonder  in  the 
far  east  glimmered  Centerville,  its  hitherward  roads, 
already  in  the  sabbath  sunrise,  full  of  brave  bluecoats 
choking  with  Virginia  dust  and  throwing  away  their 
hot  blankets  as  they  came.  Here  she  made  out  Stone 
Bridge,  guarded  by  a  brigade  called  Jackson's;  here, 
crossing  it  east  and  west,  the  Warrenton  turnpike,  and 
yonder  north  of  them  that  rise  of  dust  above  the  trees 
which  meant  a  flanking  Federal  column  and  crept  west 
ward  as  Evans  watched  it,  toward  Sudley  Springs,  ford, 
mill,  and  church,  where  already  much  blue  infantry  had 

166 


Manassas 

stolen  round  by  night  from  Centerville.  Here,  leading 
south  from  these,  she  descried  the  sunken  Sudley  road, 
that  with  a  dip  and  a  rise  crossed  the  turnpike  and 
Young's  Branch.  There  eastward  of  it  the  branch 
turned  north-east  and  then  south-east  between  those 
sloping  fields  beyond  which  Evans  and  Wheat  were 
presently  fighting  Burnside;  through  which  Bee,  among 
bursting  shells,  pressed  to  their  aid  against  such  as 
Keyes  and  Sherman,  and  back  over  which,  after  a  long, 
hot  struggle,  she  could  see — could  hear — the  aiders  and 
the  aided  swept  in  one  torn,  depleted  tumult,  shattered, 
confounded,  and  made  the  more  impotent  by  their  own 
clamor.  Here  was  the  many-ravined,  tree-dotted, 
southward  rise  by  which,  in  concave  line,  the  Northern 
brigades  and  batteries,  pressing  across  the  bends  of  the 
branch,  advanced  to  the  famed  Henry  house  plateau — 
that  key  of  victory  where  by  midday  fell  all  the  horrid 
weight  of  the  battle;  where  the  guns  of  Ricketts  and 
Griffen  for  the  North  and  of  Walton  and  Imboden  for 
the  South  crashed  and  mowed,  and  across  and  across 
which  the  opposing  infantries  volleyed  and  bled, 
screamed,  groaned,  swayed,  and  drove  each  other, 
staggered,  panted,  rallied,  cheered,  and  fell  or  fought 
on  among  the  fallen.  Here  cried  Bee  to  the  dazed 
crowd,  "Look  at  Jackson's  brigade  standing  like  a 
stone  wall."  Here  Beauregard  and  Johnson  formed 
their  new  front  of  half  a  dozen  states  on  Alabama's 
colours,  and  here  a  bit  later  the  Creole  general's  horse 
was  shot  under  him.  Northward  here,  down  the  slope 
and  over  the  branch,  rolled  the  conflict,  and  there  on  the 
opposite  rise,  among  his  routed  blues,  was  Greenleaf 
disabled  and  taken. 


Kincaid's  Battery 

All  these,  I  say,  were  in  Anna's  changing  picture. 
Here  from  the  left,  out  of  the  sunken  road,  came  How 
ard,  Heintzelman,  and  their  like,  and  here  in  the  oak 
wood  that  lay  across  it  the  blue  and  gray  lines  spent 
long  terms  of  agony  mangling  each  other.  Here  early 
n  that  part  of  the  struggle — sent  for  at  last  by  Beaure- 
gard  himself,  they  say — came  Kincaid's  Battery,  whirl 
ing,  shouting,  whip-cracking,  sweating,  with  Hilary 
well  ahead  of  them  and  Mandeville  at  his  side,  to  the 
ground  behind  the  Henry  house  when  it  had  been  lost 
and  retaken  and  all  but  lost  again.  Here  Hilary,  spur 
ring  on  away  from  his  bounding  guns  to  choose  them  a 
vantage  ground,  broke  into  a  horrid  melee  alone  and 
was  for  a  moment  made  prisoner,  but  in  the  next  had 
handed  his  captors  over  to  fresh  graycoats  charging; 
and  here,  sweeping  into  action  with  all  the  grace  and 
precision  of  the  drill-ground  at  Camp  Callender,  came 
his  battery,  his  and  hers!  Here  rode  Bartleson,  here 
Villeneuve,  Maxime  with  the  colors,  Tracy,  Sam 
Gibbs;  and  here  from  the  chests  sprang  Violett,  Rare- 
shide,  Charlie  and  their  scores  of  fellows,  unlimbered, 
sighted,  blazed,  sponged,  reloaded,  pealed  again,  sent 
havoc  into  the  enemy  and  got  havoc  from  them.  Here 
one  and  another  groaned,  and  another  and  another 
dumbly  fell.  Here  McStea,  and  St.  Ange,  Converse, 
Fusilier,  Avendano,  Ned  Ferry  and  others  limbered  up 
for  closer  work,  galloped,  raced,  plunged,  reared,  and 
stumbled,  gained  the  new  ground  and  made  it  a  worse 
slaughter-pen  than  the  first,  yet  held  on  and  blazed, 
pealed,  and  smoked  on,  begrimed  and  gory.  Here  was 
Tracy  borne  away  to  field  hospital  leaving  Avendano 
and  McStea  groveling  in  anguish  under  the  wheels,  and 

168 


Letters 

brave  Converse  and  young  Willie  Calder,  hot-headed 
Fusilier  and  dear  madcap  Jules  St.  Ange  lying  near 
them  out  of  pain  forever.  Yet  here  their  fellows 
blazed  on  and  on,  black,  shattered,  decimated,  short 
of  horses,  one  caisson  blown  up,  and  finally  dragged 
away  to  bivouac,  proud  holders  of  all  their  six  Callender 
guns,  their  silken  flag  shot-torn  but  unsoiled  and  furled 
only  when  shells  could  no  longer  reach  the  flying  foe. 


XXXIII 

LETTERS 

HARDLY  any  part  of  this  picture  had  come  to  Anna 
from  Hilary  himself. 

Yes,  they  were  in  correspondence — after  a  fashion. 
That  signified  nothing,  she  would  have  had  you  under 
stand;  so  were  Charlie  and  Victorine,  so  were — oh! — 
every  girl  wrote  to  somebody  at  the  front;  one  could  not 
do  less  and  be  a  patriot.  Some  girl  patriots  had  a 
dozen  on  their  list.  Some  lads  had  a  dozen  on  theirs. 

Ah,  me!  those  swan- white,  sky-blue,  rose-pink 
maidens  who  in  every  town  and  on  every  plantation 
from  Memphis  to  Charleston,  from  Richmond  to  New 
Orleans,  despatched  their  billets  by  the  forlornly  pre 
carious  post  only  when  they  could  not  send  them  by  the 
"urbanity"  of  such  or  such  a  one!  Could  you  have 
contrasted  with  them  the  homeless,  shelterless,  pencil- 
borrowing,  elbow-scratching,  musty,  fusty  tatterde 
malions  who  stretched  out  on  the  turfless  ground  beside 
their  mess  fires  to  extort  or  answer  those  cautious  or  in 
cautious  missives,  or  who  for  the  fortieth  time  drew 

169 


Kincaid's  Battery 

them  from  hiding  to  reread  into  their  guarded  or  un 
guarded  lines  meanings  never  dreamed  by  their  writers, 
you  could  not  have  laughed  without  a  feeling  of  tears, 
or  felt  the  tears  without  smiling.  Many  a  chap's  epistle 
was  scrawled,  many  a  one  even  rhymed,  in  a  rifle-pit 
with  the  enemy's  shells  bursting  over.  Many  a  one  was 
feebly  dictated  to  some  blessed,  unskilled  volunteer 
nurse  in  a  barn  or  smoke-house  or  in  some  cannon- 
shattered  church.  From  the  like  of  that  who  with  a 
woman's  heart  could  withhold  reply?  Yes,  Anna  and 
Hilary  were  in  correspondence. 

So  were  Flora  and  Irby.  So  were  Hilary  and  Flora. 
Was  not  Flora  Anna's  particular  friend  and  Hilary's 
" pilot"?  She  had  accepted  the  office  on  condition 
that,  in  his  own  heart's  interest,  their  dear  Anna  should 
not  know  of  it. 

"The  better  part  of  life" — she  wrote — "is  it  not 
made  up  of  such  loving  concealments?" 

And  as  he  read  the  words  in  his  tent  he  smilingly 
thought,  "That  looks  true  even  if  it  isn't!" 

Her  letters  were  much  more  frequent  than  Anna's 
and  always  told  of  Anna  fondly,  often  with  sweet  praises 
— not  so  sweet  to  him — of  her  impartial  graciousness 
to  her  semicircle  of  brass-buttoned  worshippers.  Lately 
Flora  had  mentioned  Greenleaf  in  a  modified  way 
especially  disturbing. 

If  Anna  could  have  made  any  one  a  full  confidante 
such  might  have  been  Flora,  but  to  do  so  was  not  in  her 
nature.  She  could  trust  without  stint.  Distrust,  as  we 
know,  was  intolerable  to  her.  She  could  not  doubt  her 
friends,  but  neither  could  she  unveil  her  soul.  Never 
theless,  more  than  once,  as  the  two  exchanged — in  a 

170 


Letters 

purely  academical  way — their  criticisms  of  life,  some 
query  raised  by  Anna  showed  just  what  had  been  pass 
ing  between  her  and  Hilary  and  enabled  Flora  to  keep 
them  steered  apart. 

No  hard  task,  the  times  being  so  highly  calculated  to 
make  the  course  of  true  love  a  "hard  road  to  travel," 
as  the  singing  soldier  boys  called  "Jordan."  Letters, 
at  any  time,  are  sufficiently  promotive  of  misunder 
standings,  but  in  the  Confederacy  they  drifted  from 
camp  to  camp,  from  pocket  to  pocket,  like  letters  in 
bottles  committed  to  the  sea.  The  times  being  such,  I 
say,  and  Hilary  and  Anna  as  they  were :  he  a  winner  of 
men,  yes!  but  by  nature,  not  art;  to  men  and  women 
equally,  a  grown  up,  barely  grown  up,  boy.  That  is 
why  women  could  afford  to  like  him  so  frankly.  The 
art  of  courtship — of  men  or  women — was  not  in  him. 
Otherwise  the  battery — every  gun  of  which,  they  say, 
counted  for  two  as  long  as  he  was  by — must  have  lost 
him  through  promotion  before  that  first  year  was  half 
out.  The  moment  he  became  a  conscious  suitor,  to 
man  or  woman,  even  by  proxy,  his  power  went  from 
him;  from  pen,  from  tongue,  from  countenance.  And 
Anna — I  may  have  shown  the  fact  awkwardly,  but  cer 
tainly  you  see — Anna  was  incurably  difficult. 

Too  much  else  awaits  our  telling  to  allow  here  a  re 
cital  of  their  hearts*  war  while  love — and  love's  foes — 
hid  in  winter  quarters,  as  it  were.  That  is  to  say,  from 
the  season  of  that  mad  kiss  which  she  had  never  for 
given  herself  (much  less  repented),  to  the  day  of  Beau- 
regard's  appeal,  early  in  '62,  to  all  the  plantations  and 
churches  in  Dixie's  Land  to  give  him  their  bells,  bells, 
bells — every  bit  of  bronze  or  brass  they  could  rake  up 

171 


Kincaid's  Battery 

or  break  off — to  be  cast  into  cannon;  and  to  his  own 
Louisiana  in  particular  to  send  him,  hot  speed,  five 
thousand  more  men  to  help  him  and  Albert  Sidney 
Johnston  drive  Buel  and  Grant  out  of  Tennessee. 

Before  the  battery  had  got  half  way  to  Virginia  Hilary 
had  written  back  to  Anna  his  inevitable  rhapsody  over 
that  amazing  performance  of  hers,  taking  it  as  patent 
and  seal  of  her  final,  utter,  absolute  self -bestowal.  And 
indeed  this  it  might  have  turned  out  to  be  had  he  but 
approached  it  by  a  discreet  circuit  through  the  sim 
plest  feminine  essentials  of  negative  make-believe.  But 
to  spring  out  upon  it  in  that  straightforward  manner — ! 
From  May  to  February  her  answer  to  this  was  the  only 
prompt  reply  he  ever  received  from  her.  It  crowds  our 
story  backward  for  a  moment,  for  it  came  on  one  of 
those  early  Peninsula  days  previous  to  Manassas,  hap 
pening,  oddly,  to  reach  him — by  the  hand  of  Villeneuve 
— as  he  stood,  mounted,  behind  the  battery,  under  a 
smart  skirmish  fire.  With  a  heart  leaping  in  joyous 
assurance  he  opened  the  small  missive  and  bent  his 
eyes  upon  its  first  lines. 

As  he  did  so  a  hostile  shell,  first  that  had  ever  come 
so  near,  burst  just  in  front  of  his  guns.  A  big  lump  of 
metal  struck  one  of  them  on  the  chase,  glanced,  clipped 
off  half  the  low  top  of  his  forage-cap  and  struck  in  the 
trunk  of  an  oak  behind  him,  and  as  his  good  horse 
flinched  and  quivered  he  looked  unwillingly  from  the 
page  toward  a  puff  of  white  smoke  on  a  distant  hill,  and 
with  a  broad  smile  said — a  mere  nonsense  word;  but 
the  humor  of  such  things  has  an  absurd  valuation  and 
persistency  in  camps,  and  for  months  afterward,  "  Ah-r? 
— indeed!"  was  the  battery's  gay  response  to  every 

172 


Letters 

startling  sound.  He  had  luck  in  catchwords,  this 
Hilary.  He  fought  the  scrimmage  through  with  those 
unread  pages  folded  slim  between  a  thumb  and  fore 
finger,  often  using  them  to  point  out  things,  and  when 
after  it  he  had  reopened  them  and  read  them  through 
— and  through  again — to  their  dizzying  close,  the  battery 
surgeon  came  murmuring  privately 

"Cap,  what's  wrong;   bad  news?" 

"Oh!"  said  Hilary,  looking  up  from  a  third  reading, 
"what,  this?  No-o!  nothing  wrong  in  this.  I  was 
wrong.  I'm  all  right  now." 

"  No,  you're  not,  Captain.  You  come  along  now  and 
lie  down.  The  windage  of  that  chunk  of  iron  has " 

"Why,  Doc,  I  shouldn't  wonder!  If  you'll  just  keep 
everybody  away  from  me  awhile,  yourself  included,  I 
will  lie  down,"  said  the  unnerved  commander,  and 
presently,  alone  and  supine,  softly  asked  himself  with 
grim  humor,  "Which  chunk  of  iron?" 

The  actual  text  of  Anna's  chunk  was  never  divulged, 
even  to  Flora.  We  do  not  need  it.  Neither  did  Flora. 
One  of  its  later  effects  was  to  give  the  slender  corre 
spondence  which  crawled  after  it  much  more  historical 
value  to  the  battery  and  the  battery's  beloved  home 
city  than  otherwise  it  might  have  had.  From  Virginia 
it  told  spiritedly  of  men,  policies,  and  movements; 
sketched  cabinet  officers,  the  president,  and  the  great 
leaders  and  subleaders  in  the  field — Stuart,  Gordon, 
Fitzhugh  Lee.  It  gave  droll,  picturesque  accounts  of 
the  artillerist's  daily  life;  of  the  hard,  scant  fare  and 
the  lucky  feast  now  and  then  on  a  rabbit  or  a  squirrel, 
turtles'  eggs,  or  wild  strawberries.  It  depicted  moon 
light  rides  to  dance  with  Shenandoah  girls;  the  playing 

173 


KincaicTs  Battery 

of  camp  charades;  and  the  singing  of  war,  home,  and 
love  songs  around  the  late  camp  fire,  timed  to  the  antic 
banjo  or  the  sentimental  guitar.  Drolly,  yet  with  ten 
derness  for  others,  it  portrayed  mountain  storm,  valley 
freshet,  and  heart-breaking  night  marches  beside  totter 
ing  guns  in  the  straining,  sucking,  leaden-heavy,  red 
clay,  and  then,  raptly,  the  glories  of  sunrise  and  sunset 
over  the  contours  of  the  Blue  Ridge.  And  it  explained 
the  countless  things  which  happily  enable  a  commander 
to  keep  himself  as  busy  as  a  mud-dauber,  however  idle 
the  camp  or  however  torn  his  own  heart. 

From  Anna's  side  came  such  stories  as  that  of  a  flag 
presentation  to  the  Sumter,  wherein  she  had  taken 
some  minor  part;  of  seeing  that  slim  terror  glide  down 
by  Callender  House  for  a  safe  escape  through  the  block 
ading  fleet  to  the  high  seas  and  a  world-wide  fame;  of 
Flora's  towboat  privateer  sending  in  one  large  but 
empty  prize  whose  sale  did  not  pay  expenses,  and  then 
being  itself  captured  by  the  blockaders;  of  "Hamlet" 
given  by  amateurs  at  the  St.  Charles  Theatre;  of  great 
distress  among  the  poor,  all  sorts  of  gayeties  for  their 
benefit,  bad  money,  bad  management,  a  grand  concert 
for  the  army  in  Arkansas,  women  in  mourning  as 
numerous  as  men  in  uniform,  and  both  men  and  women 
breaking  down  in  body  and  mind  under  the  universal 
strain. 

Historically  valuable,  you  see.  Yet  through  all  this 
impersonal  intercha  nge  love  shone  out  to  love  like  lamp 
light  through  the  bKnds  of  two  opposite  closed  windows, 
and  every  heart-hiding  letter  bore  enough  interlinear 
revealment  of  mind  and  character  to  keep  mutual  ad 
miration  glowing  and  growing.  We  might  very  justly 

174 


A  Free-Gift  Bazaar 

fancy  either  correspondent  saying  at  any  time  in  those 
ten  months  to  impatient  or  compassionate  Cupid  what 
Hilary  is  reported  to  have  said  on  one  of  the  greatest 
days  between  Manassas  and  Shiloh,  in  the  midst  of  a 
two-sided  carnage:  "Yes,  General,  hard  hit,  but  please 
don't  put  us  out  of  action." 

XXXIV 

A    FREE-GIFT    BAZAAR 

AGAIN  it  was  February.  The  flag  of  Louisiana  whose 
lone  star  and  red  and  yellow  stripes  still  hovered 
benignly  over  the  Ionic  marble  porch  of  the  city  hall, 
was  a  year  old.  A  new  general,  young  and  active,  was 
in  command  of  all  the  city's  forces,  which  again  on  the 
great  Twenty-second  paraded.  Feebly,  however;  see 
letters  to  Irby  and  Mandeville  under  Brodnax  in  Ten 
nessee,  or  to  Kincaid's  Battery  and  its  commander  in 
Virginia.  For  a  third  time  the  regimental  standards 
were  of  a  new  sort.  They  were  the  battle-flag  now. 
Its  need  had  been  learned  at  Manassas;  eleven  stars  on 
St.  Andrew's  Cross,  a  field  blood  red,  and  the  cross  span 
ning  all  the  field! 

Again  marched  Continentals,  Chasseurs,  and  so  on. 
Yet  not  as  before;  all  their  ranks  were  of  new  men; 
the  too  old,  the  too  frail,  the  too  young,  they  of  helpless 
families,  and  the  "  British  subjects."  Natives  of  France 
made  a  whole  separate  "French  Legion,"  in  red  kepis, 
blue  frocks,  and  trousers  shaped  like  inverted  tenpins, 
as  though  New  Orleans  were  Paris  itself.  The  whole 
aspect  of  things  was  alert,  anxious,  spent. 


KincaicTs  Battery 

But  it  was  only  now  this  spent  look  had  come.  Until 
lately  you  might  have  seen  entire  brigades  of  stout 
hearted  men  in  camps  near  by:  Camps  Benjamin, 
Walker,  Pulaski  and,  up  in  the  low  pine  hills  of  Tangi- 
pahoa,  Camp  Moore.  From  Camp  Lewis  alone,  in 
November,  on  that  plain  where  Kincaid's  Battery  had 
drilled  before  it  was  Kincaid's,  the  Bienville,  Crescent 
City  and  many  similar  "  Guards,"  Miles'  Artillery,  the 
Orleans  Light  Horse,  the  Orleans  Howitzers,  the 
Orleans  Guards,  the  Tirailleurs  d' Orleans,  etc.,  had 
passed  in  front  of  Governor  Moore  and  half  a  dozen 
generals,  twenty-four  thousand  strong. 

Now  these  were  mostly  gone — to  Bragg — to  Price — 
to  Lee  and  Joe  Johnston,  or  to  Albert  Sidney  Johnston 
and  Beauregard.  For  the  foe  swarmed  there,  refusing 
to  stay  "hurled  back."  True  he  was  here  also,  and  not 
merely  by  scores  as  battle  captives,  but  alarmingly  near, 
in  arms  and  by  thousands.  Terrible  Ship  Island,  occu 
pied  by  the  boys  in  gray  and  fortified,  anathematized 
for  its  horrid  isolation  and  torrid  sands,  had  at  length 
been  evacuated,  and  on  New  Year's  Day  twenty-four 
of  the  enemy's  ships  were  there  disembarking  blue-coats 
on  its  gleaming  white  dunes.  Fair  Carrollton  was 
fortified  (on  those  lines  laid  out  by  Hilary),  and  down 
at  Camp  Callender  the  siege-guns  were  manned  by  new 
cannoneers;  persistently  and  indolently  new  and  with 
out  field-pieces  or  brass  music  or  carriage  company. 

The  spent  look  was  still  gallant,  but  under  it  was  a 
feeling  of  having  awfully  miscalculated:  flour  twelve 
dollars  a  barrel  and  soon  to  be  twenty.  With  news  in 
abundance  the  papers  had  ceased  their  evening  issues, 
so  scarce  was  paper,  and  morning  editions  told  of 


A  Free-Gift  Bazaar 

Atlantic  seaports  lost,  of  Johnston's  retreat  from  Ken 
tucky,  the  fall  of  Fort  Donelson  with  its  fifteen  thousand 
men,  the  evacuation  of  Columbus  (one  of  the  Mississippi 
River's  "Gibraltars")  and  of  Nashville,  which  had 
come  so  near  being  Dixie's  capital.  And  yet  the  news 
papers 

" '  We  see  no  cause  for  despondency,' "  read  Constance 
at  the  late  breakfast  table — "oh,  Miranda,  don't  you 
see  that  with  that  spirit  we  can  never  be  subjugated?" 
She  flourished  the  brave  pages,  for  which  Anna  vainly 
reached. 

"Yes!"  said  Anna,  "but  find  the  report  of  the  Ba 
zaar!" — while  Constance  read  on:  "'Reverses,  instead 
of  disheartening,  have  aroused  our  people  to  the  highest 
pitch  of  animation,  and  their  resolution  to  conquer  is 
invincible.' " 

"Oh,  how  true!  and  ah,  dearie!" — she  pressed  her 
sister's  hand  amid  the  silver  and  porcelain  on  the  old 
mahogany — "that  news  (some  item  read  earlier,  about 
the  battery),  why,  Miranda,  just  that  is  a  sign  of  im 
pending  victory!  Straws  tell!  and  Kincaid's  Battery 
is  the " 

"Biggest  straw  in  Dixie!"  jeered  Anna,  grasping  the 
paper,  which  Constance  half  yielded  with  her  eye  still 
skimming  its  columns. 

"Here  it  is!"  cried  both,  and  rose  together. 

"'Final  Figures  of  the  St.  Louis  Hotel  Free-Gift 
Lottery  and  Bazaar' !"  called  Constance,  while  Anna's 
eyes  flew  over  the  lines. 

"What  are  they?"  exclaimed  Miranda. 

"Oh,  come  and  see!  Just  think,  Nan:  last  May,  in 
Odd-Fellows'  Hall,  how  proud  we  were  of  barely  thir- 

177 


KincaicTs  Battery 

teen  thousand,  and  here  are  sixty-eight  thousand  dol 
lars!" 

Anna  pointed  Miranda  to  a  line,  and  Miranda,  with 
their  cheeks  together,  read  out:  "'Is  there  no  end  to 
the  liberality  of  the  Crescent  City?'" 

"No-o!"  cried  gesturing  Constance,  "not  while  one 
house  stands  on  another!  Why,  'Randa,  though  every 
hall  and  hotel  from  here  to  Carrollton " 

Anna  beamingly  laid  her  ringers  on  the  lips  of  the 
enthusiast:  "Con! — Miranda! — we  can  have  a  bazaar 
right  in  this  house !  Every  friend  we've  got,  and  every 
friend  of  the  bat ' —  Oh,  come  in,  Flora  Valcour !  you're 
just  in  the  nick  o'  time — a  second  Kirby  Smith  at 
Manassas!" 

Thus  came  the  free-gift  lottery  and  bazaar  of  Cal- 
lender  House.  For  her  own  worth  as  well  as  to  enlist 
certain  valuable  folk  from  Mobile,  Flora  was,  there  and 
then — in  caucus,  as  it  were — nominated  chairman  of 
everything.  "Oh,  no,  no,  no!" — "Oh,  yes,  yes,  yes!" 
— she  "yielded  at  last  to  overpowering  numbers." 

But  between  this  first  rapturous  inception  and  an 
all-forenoon  argumentation  on  its  when,  who,  how, 
what,  and  for  what,  other  matters  claimed  notice. 
Further  news  from  Charlie!  How  was  his  wound? 
What !  a  letter  from  his  own  hand — with  full  account  of 
— what  was  this  one?  not  a  pitched  battle,  but ?" 

"Anyhow  a  victory!"  cried  Constance. 

"You  know,  Flora,  don't  you,"  asked  Miranda, 
"that  the  battery's  ordered  away  across  to  Tennessee?" 

Flora  was  genuinely  surprised. 

"Yes,"  put  in  Constance,  "to  rejoin  Beauregard — 
and  Brodnax!" 

178 


A  Free-Gift  Bazaar 

Flora  turned  to  Anna:  "You  have  that  by  letter?" 

"No!"  was  the  too  eager  reply,  "It's  here  in  the 
morning  paper."  They  read  the  item.  The  visitor 
flashed  as  she  dropped  the  sheet. 

"Now  I  see!"  she  sorely  cried,  and  tapped  Charlie's 
folded  letter.  "My  God!  Anna,  wounded  like  that, 
Hilary  Kincaid  is  letting  my  brother  go  with  them!" 

"Oh-h-h!"  exclaimed  the  other  two,  "but — my  dear! 
if  he's  so  much  better  that  he  can  be  allowed " 

"Allowed! — and  in  those  box-car'! — and  with  that 
snow — rain — gangrene — lockjaw — my  God !  And  when 
'twas  already  arrange1  to  bring  him  home!" 

Slow  Callenders!  not  to  notice  the  word  "bring"  in 
place  of  "send":  "Ah,  good,  Flora!  ah,  fine!  You'll 
see!  The  dear  boy's  coming  that  far  with  the  battery 
only  on  his  way  home  to  us!" 

"H-m-m!"  Flora  nodded  in  sore  irony,  but  then 
smiled  with  recovered  poise:  "From  Tennessee  who 
will  bring  him — before  they  have  firs'  fight  another 
battle? — and  he — my  brother?" — her  smile  grew 
droll. 

"Your  brother  sure  to  be  in  it!"  gasped  Anna.  The 
Callenders  looked  heart-wrung,  but  Flora  smiled  on  as 
she  thought  what  comfort  it  would  be  to  give  each  of 
them  some  life-long  disfigurement. 

Suddenly  Constance  cheered  up:  "Flora,  I've 
guessed  something!  Yes,  I've  guessed  who  was  in 
tending — and,  maybe,  still  intends — to  bring  him!" 

Flora  turned  prettily  to  Anna:  "Have  you?" 

Quite  as  prettily  Anna  laughed.  "Connie  does  the 
guessing  for  the  family,"  she  said. 

Flora  sparkled:  "But  don't  you  know — perchanze?" 
179 


KincaicTs  Battery 

Anna  laughed  again  and  blushed  to  the  throat  as  she 
retorted,  "What  has  that  to  do  with  our  bazaar?" 
It  had  much  to  do  with  it. 


XXXV 

THE  "SISTERS  OF  KINCAID'S  BATTERY" 

A  WEEK  or  two  ran  by,  and  now  again  it  was  March. 
Never  an  earlier  twelvemonth  had  the  women  of  New 
Orleans — nor  of  any  town  or  time — the  gentlewomen — 
spent  in  more  unselfish  or  arduous  toil. 

At  any  rate  so  were  flutteringly  construed  the  crisp 
declarations  of  our  pale  friend  of  old,  Doctor  Sevier,  as 
in  Callender  House  he  stood  (with  Anna  seated  half 
behind  him  as  near  as  flounced  crinoline  would  allow) 
beside  a  small  table  whose  fragile  beauty  shared  with 
hers  the  enthralled  contemplation  of  every  member  of 
a  numerous  flock  that  nevertheless  hung  upon  the 
Doctor's  words;  such  a  knack  have  women  of  giving 
their  undivided  attention  to  several  things  at  once. 
Flora  was  getting  her  share. 

This,  he  said,  was  a  women's — a  gentlewomen's — 
war. 

"  Ah ! "  A  stir  of  assent  ran  through  all  the  gathering. 
The  long  married,  the  newly  wed,  the  affianced,  the 
suspected,  the  debutantes,  the  post-marriageable,  every 
one  approved.  Yes,  a  gentlewomen's  war — for  the 
salvation  of  society! 

Hardly  had  this  utterance  thrilled  round,  however, 
when  the  speaker  fell  into  an  error  which  compelled 
Anna  softly  to  interrupt,  her  amazed  eyes  and  protesting 

180 


The  "Sisters  of  Kincaid's  Battery " 

smile  causing  a  general  hum  of  amusement  and  quick 
ening  of  fans.  "No-o!"  she  whispered  to  him,  "she 
was  not  chairman  of  the  L.  S.  C.  A.,  but  only  one  small 
secretary  of  that  vast  body,  and  chairman  pro  tern. — 
nothing  more! — of  this  mere  contingent  of  it,  these 
"Sisters  of  Kincaid's  Battery." 

Pro  tern.,  nothing  more!  But  that  is  how — silly  lit 
tle  Victorine  leading  the  hue  and  cry  which  suddenly 
overwhelmed  all  counter-suggestion  as  a  levee  crevasse 
sweeps  away  sand-bags — that  is  how  the  permanent 
and  combined  chairmanship  of  Sisters  and  Bazaar 
came  to  be  forcibly  thrust  upon  Anna  instead  of  Flora. 

Experienced  after  Odd-Fellow'  Hall  and  St.  Louis 
Hotel,  the  ladies  were  able  to  take  up  this  affair  as 
experts.  Especially  they  had  learned  how  to  use 
men;  to  make  them  as  handy  as — "as  hairpins," 
prompted  Miranda,  to  whom  Anna  had  whispered  it; 
and  of  men  they  needed  all  they  could  rally,  to  catch 
the  first  impact  of  the  vast  and  chaotic  miscellany  of 
things  which  would  be  poured  into  their  laps,  so  to 
speak,  and  upon  their  heads :  bronzes,  cutlery,  blankets, 
watches,  thousands  of  brick  (orders  on  the  brick-yards 
for  them,  that  is),  engravings,  pianos,  paintings,  books, 
cosmetics,  marbles,  building  lots  (their  titles),  laces, 
porcelain,  glass,  alabaster,  bales  of  cotton,  big  bank 
checks,  hair  flowers,  barouches,  bonds,  shawls,  carvings, 
shell-work  boxes,  jewellery,  silks,  ancestral  relics,  curios 
from  half  round  the  world,  wax  fruits,  tapestries,  and 
loose  sapphires,  diamonds,  rubies,  and  pearls.  The 
Callenders  and  Valcours  could  see,  in  fancy,  all  the 
first  chaos  of  it  and  all  the  fair  creation  that  was  to  arise 
from  it. 

181 


Kincaid's  Battery 

What  joy  of  planning!  The  grove  should  be  ruddy 
with  pine-knot  flares  perched  high,  and  be  full  of  lumi 
nous  tents  stocked  with  stuffs  for  sale  at  the  most  patriotic 
prices  by  Zingaras,  Fatimas,  and  Scheherazades.  All 
the  walks  of  the  garden  would  be  canopied  with  bunting 
and  gemmed  with  candles  blinking  like  the  fireflies 
round  that  bower  of  roses  by  Bendermere's  stream. 
The  verandas  would  be  enclosed  in  canvas  and  be  rich 
in  wares,  textiles,  and  works  of  art.  Armed  sentries 
from  that  splendid  command,  the  Crescent  Regiment, 
would  be  everywhere  in  the  paved  and  latticed  basement 
(gorged  with  wealth),  and  throughout  the  first  and 
second  floors.  The  centrepiece  in  the  arrangement  of 
the  double  drawing-rooms  would  be  a  great  field-piece, 
one  of  Hilary's  casting,  on  its  carriage,  bright  as  gold, 
and  flanked  with  stacks  of  muskets.  The  leading  item 
in  the  hall  would  be  an  allegorical  painting — by  a  famous 
Creole  artist  of  nearly  sixty  years  earlier — Louisiana 
Refusing  to  Enter  the  Union.  Glass  cases  borrowed  of 
merchants,  milliners  and  apothecaries  would  receive 
the  carefully  classified  smaller  gifts  of  rare  value,  and  a 
committee  of  goldsmiths,  art  critics,  and  auctioneers, 
would  set  their  prices.  If  one  of  those  torrential  hurri 
canes — however,  there  came  none. 

How  much,  now,  could  they  hope  to  clear?  Well, 
the  women  of  Alabama,  to  build  a  gun-boat,  had  raised 
two  hundred  thousand  dollars,  and 

"They  will  'ave  to  raise  mo',"  twittered  Madame 
Valcour,  "if  New  Orleans  fall'." 

"She  will  not  fall,"  remarked  Anna  from  the  chair, 
and  there  was  great  applause,  as  great  as  lace  mitts 
could  make. 

182 


Thunder-Cloud  and  Sunburst 

Speaking  of  that  smaller  stronghold,  Flora  had  a 
capital  suggestion:  Let  this  enterprise  be  named  "for 
the  common  defence."  Then,  in  the  barely  conceivable 
event  of  the  city's  fall,  should  the  proceeds  still  be  in 
women's  hands — and  it  might  be  best  to  keep  them  so 
— let  them  go  to  the  defence  of  Mobile! 

Another  idea — Miranda's  and  Victorine's — quite  as 
gladly  accepted,  and  they  two  elected  to  carry  it  out — 
was,  to  compile,  from  everybody's  letters,  a  history  of 
the  battery,  to  be  sold  at  the  bazaar.  The  large  price 
per  copy  which  that  work  commanded  was  small  com 
pared  with  what  it  would  bring  now. 

XXXVI 

THUNDER-CLOUD    AND    SUNBURST 

COULD  they  have  known  half  the  toil,  care,  and  trial 
the  preparation  of  this  Bazaar  was  to  cost  their  friends, 
apologized  the  Callenders  as  it  neared  completion,  they 
would  never  have  dared  propose  it. 

But  the  smiling  reply  was  Spartan:  "Oh!  what  are 
such  trifles  when  we  think  how  our  own  fathers,  hus 
bands,  and  brothers  have  suffered — even  in  victory!" 
The  "Sisters"  were  still  living  on  last  summer's  glory, 
and  only  by  such  indirections  alluded  to  defeats. 

Anna  smiled  as  brightly  as  any,  while  through  her 
mind  flitted  spectral  visions  of  the  secondary  and  so 
needless  carnage  in  those  awful  field-hospitals  behind 
the  battles,  and  of  the  storms  so  likely  to  follow  the 
fights,  when  the  midnight  rain  came  down  in  sheets  on 
the  wounded  still  lying  among  the  dead.  On  all  the 

183 


Kincaid's  Battery 

teeming,  bleeding  front  no  father,  husband,  or  brother 
was  hers,  but  amid  the  multitudinous  exploits  and 
agonies  her  thoughts  were  ever  on  him  who,  by  no  tie 
but  the  heart's,  had  in  the  past  year  grown  to  be  father, 
mother,  sister,  and  brother  to  the  superb  hundred  whom 
she  so  tenderly  knew,  who  so  worshipingly  knew  her, 
and  still  whose  lives,  at  every  chance,  he  was  hurling  at 
the  foe  as  stones  from  a  sling. 

"After  all,  in  these  terrible  time',"  remarked  Miss 
Valcour  in  committee  of  the  whole — last  session  before 
the  public  opening — "any  toil,  even  look'  at  selfishly,  is 
better  than  to  be  idle." 

"As  if  you  ever  looked  at  anything  selfishly!"  said  a 
matron,  and  there  was  a  patter  of  hands. 

"Or  as  if  she  were  ever  in  danger  of  being  idle!" 
fondly  put  in  a  young  battery  sister. 

As  these  two  rattled  and  crashed  homeward  in  a 
deafening  omnibus  they  shouted  further  comments  to 
each  other  on  this  same  subject.  It  was  strange,  they 
agreed,  to  see  Miss  Valcour,  right  through  the  midst  of 
these  terrible  times,  grow  daily  handsomer.  Concerning 
Anna,  they  were  of  two  opinions.  The  matron  thought 
that  at  moments  Anna  seemed  to  have  aged  three  years 
in  one,  while  to  the  girl  it  appeared  that  her  beauty — 
Anna's — had  actually  increased;  taken  a  deeper  tone, 
"or  something."  This  huge  bazaar  business,  they 
screamed,  was  something  a  girl  like  Anna  should  never 
have  been  allowed  to  undertake. 

"And  yet,"  said  the  matron  on  second  thought,  "it 
may  really  have  helped  her  to  bear  up." 

"Against  what?" 

"Oh, — all  our  general  disturbance  and  distress,  but 
184 


Thunder-Cloud  and  Sunburst 

the  battery's  in  particular.  You  know  its  very  guns 
are,  as  we  may  say,  hers,  and  everything  that  happens 
around  them,  or  to  any  one  who  belongs  to  them  in 
field,  camp,  or  hospital,  happens,  in  her  feeling,  to  her." 

The  girl  interrupted  with  a  knowing  touch:  "You 
realize  there's  something  else,  don't  you?" 

Her  companion  showed  pain:  "Yes,  but — I  hoped 
you  hadn't  heard  of  it.  I  can't  bear  to  talk  about  it. 
I  know  how  common  it  is  for  men  and  girls  to  trifle  with 
each  other,  but  for  such  as  he — who  had  the  faith  of  all 
of  us,  yes,  and  of  all  his  men,  that  he  wasn't  as  other 
men  are — for  Hilary  Kincaid  to  dawdle  with  Anna — 
with  Anna  Callender " 

"Oh I"  broke  in  the  girl,  a  hot  blush  betraying  her 
own  heart,  "I  don't  think  you've  got  the  thing  right 
at  all.  Why,  it's  Anna  who's  making  the  trouble! 
The  dawdling  is  all  hers!  Oh,  I  have  it  from  the  best 
authority,  though  I'm  not  at  liberty " 

"My  dear  girl,  you've  been  misled.  The  fault  is  all 
his.  I  know  it  from  one  who  can't  be  mistaken." 

The  damsel  blushed  worse.  "Well,  at  any  rate,"  she 
said,  "the  case  doesn't  in  any  slightest  way  involve 
Miss  Valcour." 

"Oh,  I  know  that!"  was  the  cocksure  reply  as  they 
alighted  in  Canal  Street  to  take  an  uptown  mule-car. 

Could  Madame  and  Flora  have  overheard,  how  they 
would  have  smiled  to  each  other. 

With  now  a  wary  forward  step  and  now  a  long  pause, 
and  now  another  short  step  and  another  pause,  Hilary, 
in  his  letters  to  Anna,  despite  Flora's  often  successful 
contrivings,  had  ventured  back  toward  that  understand 
ing  for  which  the  souls  of  both  were  starving,  until  at 

185 


Kincaid's  Battery 

length  he  had  sent  one  which  seemed,  itself,  to  kneel, 
for  him,  at  her  feet — would  have  seemed,  had  it  not 
miscarried.  But,  by  no  one's  craft,  merely  through  the 
"  terribleness "  of  the  times,  it  had  gone  forever  astray. 
When,  not  knowing  this,  he  despatched  another,  this 
latter  had  promptly  arrived,  but  its  unintelligible  allu 
sions  to  lines  in  the  lost  forerunner  were  unpardonable 
for  lack  of  that  forerunner's  light,  and  it  contained 
especially  one  remark — trivial  enough — which,  because 
written  in  the  irrepressible  facetiousness  so  inborn  in 
him,  but  taken,  alas!  in  the  ineradicable  earnest  so 
natural  to  her,  had  compelled  her  to  reply  in  words 
which  made  her  as  they  went,  and  him  as  they  smote 
him,  seem  truly  to  have  "aged  three  years  in  one." 
Yet  hardly  had  they  left  her  before  you  would  have 
said  she  had  recovered  the  whole  three  years  and  a 
fraction  over,  on  finding  a  postscript,  till  then  most 
unaccountably  overlooked,  which  said  that  its  writer 
had  at  that  moment  been  ordered  (as  soon  as  he  could 
accomplish  this  and  that  and  so  and  so)  to  hasten 
home  to  recruit  the  battery  with  men  of  his  own  choice, 
and  incidentally  to  bring  the  wounded  Charlie  with  him. 
Such  godsends  raise  the  spring-tides  of  praise  and 
human  kindness  in  us,  and  it  was  on  the  very  next 
morning,  after  finding  that  postscript,  that  there 
had  come  to  Anna  her  splendid  first  thought  of  the 
Bazaar. 

And  now  behold  it,  a  visible  reality!  Unlighted  as 
yet,  unpeopled,  but  gorgeous,  multiform,  sentinelled, 
and  ready,  it  needed  but  the  touch  of  the  taper  to  set 
forth  all  the  glories  of  art  and  wealth  tenfolded  by  self- 
sacrifice  for  a  hallowed  cause.  Here  was  the  Bazaar, 

186 


Thunder-Cloud  and  Sunburst 

and  yonder,  far  away  on  the  southern  border  of  Tennes 
see,  its  wasted  ranks  still  spruce  in  their  tatters,  the 
battery;  iron-hearted  Bartleson  in  command;  its  six 
yellow  daughters  of  destruction  a  trifle  black  in  the  lips, 
but  bright  on  the  cheeks  and  virgins  all;  Charlie  on  the 
roster  though  not  in  sight,  the  silken-satin  standard  well 
in  view,  rent  and  pierced,  but  showing  seven  red  days 
of  valor  legended  on  its  folds,  and  with  that  white- 
moustached  old  centaur,  Maxime,  still  upholding  it  in 
action  and  review. 

Intermediate,  there,  yonder,  and  here,  from  the 
farthest  Mississippi  State  line  clear  down  to  New 
Orleans,  were  the  camps  of  instruction,  emptying 
themselves  northward,  pouring  forth  infantry,  cavalry, 
artillery  by  every  train  that  could  be  put  upon  the  worn- 
out  rails  and  by  every  main-travelled  wagon  road.  But 
homeward-bound  Charlie  and  his  captain,  where  were 
they?  Irby  knew. 

Flora,  we  have  seen,  had  been  willing,  eager,  for 
them  to  come — to  arrive;  not  because  Charlie,  but 
because  his  captain,  was  one  of  the  two.  But  Irby, 
never  sure  of  her,  and  forever  jealous  of  the  ladies' 
man,  had  contrived,  in  a  dull  way,  to  detain  the  home- 
comers  in  mid-journey,  with  telegraphic  orders  to  see 
here  a  commandant  and  there  a  factory  of  arms  and 
hurry  men  and  munitions  to  the  front.  So  he  killed 
time  and  tortured  hope  for  several  hearts,  and  that 
was  a  comfort  in  itself. 

However,  here  was  the  Bazaar.  After  all,  its  sentinels 
were  not  of  the  Crescent  Regiment,  for  the  same  grave 
reason  which  postponed  the  opening  until  to-morrow; 
the  fact  that  to-day  that  last  flower  of  the  city's  young 

187 


Kincaid's  Battery 

high-life  was  leaving  for  the  fields  of  war,  as  Kincaid's 
Battery  had  left  in  the  previous  spring.  Yet,  oh,  how 
differently!  Again  up  St.  Charles  Street  and  down 
Calliope  the  bands  played,  the  fifes  squealed;  once 
more  the  old  men  marched  ahead,  opened  ranks,  let  the 
serried  youngsters  through  and  waved  and  hurrahed 
and  kissed  and  wept;  but  all  in  a  new  manner,  far 
more  poignant  than  the  earlier.  God  only  knew  what 
was  to  happen  now,  to  those  who  went  or  to  those  who 
stayed,  or  where  or  how  any  two  of  them  should  ever 
meet  again.  The  Callenders,  as  before,  were  there. 
Anna  had  come  definitely  resolved  to  give  one  particu 
lar  beardless  Dick  Smith  a  rousing  kiss,  purely  to  nullify 
that  guilty  one  of  last  year.  But  when  the  time  came 
she  could  not,  the  older  one  had  made  it  impossible; 
and  when  the  returning  bands  broke  out — 

"Charlie  is  my  darling!  my  darling!  my  darling!" 

and  the  tears  came  dripping  from  under  Connie's  veil 
and  Victorine's  and  Miranda's  and  presently  her  own, 
she  was  glad  of  the  failure. 

As  they  were  driving  homeward  across  Canal  Street, 
she  noted,  out  beyond  the  Free  Market,  a  steamboat 
softly  picking  its  way  in  to  the  levee.  Some  coal- 
barges  were  there,  she  remembered,  lading  with  pitch- 
pine  and  destined  as  fire-ships,  by  that  naval  lieutenant 
of  the  despatch-boat  whom  we  know,  against  the  Fed 
eral  fleet  lying  at  the  head  of  the  passes. 

The  coachman  named  the  steamer  to  Constance: 
"Yass,  'm,  de  ole  Genial  Quitman;  dass  her." 

"From  Vicksburg  and  the  Bends!"  cried  the  in 
quirer.  "Why,  who  knows  but  Charlie  Val — ?" 

188 


"I'm  Come  Hame,  My  Love" 

With  both  hands  she  clutched  Miranda  and  Victorine, 
and  brightened  upon  Anna. 

"And  Flora  not  with  us!"  was  the  common  lament. 


XXXVII 
"TILL  HE  SAID,  'I'M  COME  HAME,  MY  LOVE'" 

How  absurdly  poor  the  chance!  Yet  they  bade  the 
old  coachman  turn  that  way,  and  indeed  the  facts  were 
better  than  the  hope  of  any  one  of  them.  Charlie, 
very  gaunt  and  battered,  but  all  the  more  enamored  of 
himself  therefor  and  for  the  new  chevrons  of  a  gun 
corporal  on  his  dingy  sleeve,  was  actually  aboard  that 
boat.  In  one  of  the  small  knots  of  passengers  on  her 
boiler  deck  he  was  modestly  companioning  with  a  cap 
tain  of  infantry  and  two  of  staff,  while  they  now  ex 
changed  merry  anecdotes  of  the  awful  retreat  out  of 
Tennessee  into  Mississippi,  now  grimly  damned  this  or 
that  bad  strategy,  futile  destruction,  or  horrible  suffer 
ing,  now  re-discussed  the  comical  chances  of  a  bet  of 
General  Brodnax's,  still  pending,  and  now,  with  the 
crowd,  moved  downstairs  to  the  freight  deck  as  the 
boat  began  to  nose  the  wharf. 

Meanwhile  the  Calenders'  carriage  had  made  easy 
speed.  Emerging  by  the  Free  Market,  it  met  an  open 
hack  carrying  six  men.  At  the  moment  every  one  was 
cringing  in  a  squall  of  dust,  but  as  well  as  could  be 
seen  these  six  were  the  driver,  a  colored  servant  at  his 
side,  an  artillery  corporal,  and  three  officers.  Some 
army  wagons  hauling  pine-knots  to  the  fire-fleet  com 
pelled  both  carriages  to  check  up.  Thereupon,  the 

189 


Kincaid's  Battery 

gust  passing  and  Victorine  getting  a  better  glance  at  the 
men,  she  tossed  both  hands,  gave  a  stifled  cry  and 
began  to  laugh  aloud. 

"Charlie!"  cried  Anna.    "Steve!"  cried  Constance. 

"And  Captain  Irby!"  remarked  Miranda. 

The  infantry  captain,  a  transient  steamboat  acquaint 
ance,  used  often  afterward  to  say  that  he  never  saw 
anything  prettier  than  those  four  wildly  gladdened 
ladies  unveiling  in  the  shade  of  their  parasols.  I 
doubt  if  he  ever  did.  He  talked  with  Anna,  who  gave 
him  so  sweet  an  attention  that  he  never  suspected  she 
was  ravenously  taking  in  every  word  the  others  dropped 
behind  her. 

"But  where  he  is,  that  Captain  Kincaid?"  asked 
Victorine  of  Charlie  a  second  time. 

"Well,  really,"  stammered  the  boy  at  last,  "we — we 
can't  say,  just  now,  where  he  is." 

("He's  taken  prisoner!"  wailed  Anna's  heart  while 
she  let  the  infantry  captain  tell  her  that  hacks,  in  Nash 
ville  on  the  Sunday  after  Donelson,  were  twenty-five 
dollars  an  hour.) 

"He  means,"  she  heard  Mandeville  put  in,  "he 
means — Charlie — only  that  we  muz  not  tell.  'Tis  a 
sicret." 

"You've sent  him  into  the  enemy's  lines!"  cried  Con 
stance  to  Irby  in  one  of  her  intuitions. 

"We?"  responded  the  grave  Irby,  "No,  not  we." 

"Captain  Mandeville,"  exclaimed  Victorine,  "us, 
you  don't  need  to  tell  us  some  white  lies." 

The  Creole  shrugged:  "We  are  telling  you  only  the 
whitess  we  can!" 

("Yes,"  the  infantry  captain  said,  "with  Memphis 
190 


"I'm  Come  Hame,  My  Love" 

we  should  lose  the  largest  factory  of  cartridges  in  the 
Confederacy.") 

But  this  was  no  place  for  parleying.  So  while  the 
man  next  the  hack-driver,  ordered  by  Mandeville  and 
laden  with  travelling-bags,  climbed  to  a  seat  by  the 
Calenders'  coachman  the  aide-de-camp  crowded  in 
between  Constance  and  Victorine,  the  equipage  turned 
from  the  remaining  soldiers,  and  off  the  ladies  spun 
for  home,  Anna  and  Miranda  riding  backward  to  have 
the  returned  warrior  next  his  doting  wife.  Victorine 
was  dropped  on  the  way  at  the  gate  of  her  cottage. 
When  the  others  reached  the  wide  outer  stair  of  their 
own  veranda,  and  the  coachman's  companion  had 
sprung  down  and  opened  the  carriage,  Mandeville 
was  still  telling  of  Mandeville,  and  no  gentle  hearer 
had  found  any  chance  to  ask  further  about  that  missing 
one  of  whom  the  silentest  was  famishing  to  know  what 
ever — good  or  evil — there  was  to  tell.  Was  Steve  avoid 
ing  their  inquiries  ?  wondered  Anna. 

Up  the  steps  went  first  the  married  pair,  the  wife 
lost  in  the  hero,  the  hero  in  himself.  Was  he,  truly? 
thought  Anna,  or  was  he  only  trying,  kindly,  to  appear 
so?  The  ever-smiling  Miranda  followed.  A  step 
within  the  house  Mandeville,  with  eyes  absurdly  aflame, 
startled  first  his  wife  by  clutching  her  arm,  and  then 
Miranda  by  beckoning  them  into  a  door  at  their  right, 
past  unheeded  treasures  of  the  Bazaar,  and  to  a  front 
window.  Yet  through  its  blinds  they  could  discover 
only  what  they  had  just  left;  the  carriage,  with  Anna 
still  in  it,  the  garden,  the  grove,  an  armed  soldier  on 
guard  at  the  river  gate,  another  at  the  foot  of  the  steps, 
a  third  here  at  the  top. 

191 


Kincaid's  Battery 

It  was  good  to  Anna  to  rest  her  head  an  instant  on 
the  cushioning  behind  it  and  close  her  eyes.  With  his 
rag  of  a  hat  on  the  ground  and  his  head  tightly  wrapped 
in  the  familiar  Madras  kerchief  of  the  slave  deck-hand, 
the  attendant  at  the  carriage  side  reverently  awaited  the 
relifting  of  her  lids.  The  old  coachman  glanced  back 
on  her. 

"Missy?"  he  tenderly  ventured.  But  the  lids  still 
drooped,  though  she  rose. 

"Watch  out  fo'  de  step,"  said  the  nearer  man.  His 
tone  was  even  more  musically  gentle  than  the  other's, 
yet  her  eyes  instantly  opened  into  his  and  she  started 
so  visibly  that  her  foot  half  missed  and  she  had  to 
catch  his  saving  hand. 

"  Stiddy !  stiddy !"  He  slowly  let  the  cold,  slim  fingers 
out  of  his  as  she  started  on,  but  she  swayed  again  and 
he  sprang  and  retook  them.  For  half  a  breath  she 
stared  at  him  like  a  wild  bird  shot,  glanced  at  the 
sentinels,  below,  above,  and  then  pressed  up  the  stair. 

Constance,  behind  the  shutters,  wept.  "  Go  away," 
she  pleaded  to  her  husband,  "  oh,  go  away ! "  but  pushed 
him  without  effect  and  peered  down  again.  "He's 
won!"  she  exclaimed  in  soft  ecstasy,  "he's  won  at  last!" 

"Yes,  he's  win!"  hoarsely  whispered  the  aide-de 
camp.  "  He's  win  the  bet ! " 

Constance  flashed  indignantly:  "What  has  he  bet?" 

"  Bet.  '  He  has  bet  three-ee  general '  he'll  pazz  down 
Canal  Street  and  through  the  middF  of  the  city,  un- 
reco'nize!  And  now  he's  done  it,  they'll  let  him  do  the 
rest!"  From  his  Creole  eyes  the  enthusiast  blazed  a 
complete  argument,  that  an  educated  commander,  so 
disguised  and  traversing  an  enemy's  camp,  can  be 

192 


"I'm  Come  Hame,  My  Love" 

worth  a  hundred  of  the  common  run  who  go  by  the 
hard  name  of  spy,  and  may  decide  the  fortunes  of  a 
whole  campaign:  "They'll  let  him!  and  he'll  get  the 
prom-otion ! " 

"Ho-oh!"  breathed  the  two  women,  "he's  getting  all 
the  promotion  he  wants,  right  now!"  The  three  heard 
Anna  pass  into  the  front  drawing-room  across  the  hall, 
the  carriage  move  off  anfl  the  disguised  man  enter  the 
hall  and  set  down  the  travelling-bags.  They  stole  away 
through  the  library  and  up  a  rear  stair. 

It  was  not  yet  late  enough  to  set  guards  within  the 
house.  No  soul  was  in  the  drawing-rooms.  In  the  front 
one,  on  its  big  wheels  between  two  stacks  of  bayoneted 
rifles,  beneath  a  splendor  of  flags  and  surrounded  by 
innumerable  costly  offerings,  rested  as  mutely  as  a 
seated  idol  that  superior  engine  of  death  and  woe,  the 
great  brass  gun.  Anna  stole  to  it,  sunk  on  her  knees, 
crossed  her  trembling  arms  about  its  neck  and  rested 
her  brow  on  its  face. 

She  heard  the  tread  in  the  hall,  quaked  to  rise  and 
flee,  and  yet  could  not  move.  It  came  upon  the 
threshold  and  paused.  "Anna,"  said  the  voice  that 
had  set  her  heart  on  fire  across  the  carriage  step.  She 
sprang  up,  faced  round,  clutched  the  great  gun,  and 
stood  staring.  Her  follower  was  still  in  slave  garb, 
but  now  for  the  first  time  he  revealed  his  full  stature. 
His  black  locks  were  free  and  the  "Madras"  dropped 
from  his  fingers  to  the  floor.  He  advanced  a  pace  or 
two. 

"Anna,"  he  said  again,  "Anna  Callender," — he 
came  another  step — "I've  come  back,  Anna,  to — 
to — "  he  drew  a  little  nearer.  She  gripped  the  gun. 


Kincaid's  Battery 

He  lighted  up  drolly:  "Don't  you  know  what  I've 
come  for?  I  didn't  know,  myself,  till  just  now,  or  1 
shouldn't  have  come  in  this  rig,  though  many  a  better 
man's  in  worse  these  days.  I  didn't  know — because — I 
couldn't  hope.  I've  come — "  he  stole  close — his  arms 
began  to  lift — she  straightened  to  her  full  height,  but 
helplessly  relaxed  as  he  smiled  down  upon  it. 

"I've  come  not  just  to  get  your  promise,  Anna  Cal- 
lender,  but  to  muster  you  in;  to  marry  you." 

She  flinched  behind  the  gun's  muzzle  in  resentful 
affright.  He  lowered  his  palms  in  appeal  to  her  wis 
dom.  "It's  the  right  thing,  Anna,  the  only  safe  way! 
I've  known  it  was,  ever  since  Steve  Mandeville's  wed 
ding.  Oh!  it  takes  a  colossal  assurance  to  talk  to  you 
so,  Anna  Callender,  but  I've  got  the  colossal  assurance. 
I've  got  that,  beloved,  and  you've  got  all  the  rest — my 
heart — my  soul — my  life.  Give  me  yours." 

Anna  had  shrunk  in  against  the  farther  wheel,  but 
now  rallied  and  moved  a  step  forward.  "  Let  me  pass," 
she  begged.  "Give  me  a  few  moments  to  myself. 
You  can  wait  here.  I'll  come  back." 

He  made  room.  She  moved  by.  But  hardly  had 
she  passed  when  a  soft  word  stopped  her.  She  turned 
inquiringly  and  the  next  instant — Heaven  only  knows 
if  first  on  his  impulse  or  on  hers — she  was  in  his  arms, 
half  stifled  on  his  breast,  and  hanging  madly  from  his 
neck  while  his  kisses  fell  upon  her  brow — temples — 
eyes — and  rested  on  her  lips. 

Flora  sat  reading  a  note  just  come  from  that  same 
"A.  C."  Her  brother  had  gone  to  call  on  Victorine. 
Irby  had  just  bade  the  reader  good-by,  to  return  soon 

194 


And  the  next  instant  she  was  in  his  arms 


"I'm  Come  Hame,  My  Love" 

and  go  with  her  to  Callender  House  to  see  the  Bazaar. 
Madame  Valcour  turned  from  a  window  with  a  tart 
inquiry: 

"  And  all  you  had  to  do  was  to  say  yes  to  him  ?  " 

"That  would  have  been  much,"  absently  replied  the 
reader,  turning  a  page. 

"'Twould  have  been  little! — to  make  him  rich! — 
and  us  also!" 

"Not  us,"  said  the  abstracted  girl;  "me."  Some 
thing  in  the  missive  caused  her  brows  to  knit. 

"And  still  you  trifle!"  nagged  the  grandam,  "while 
I  starve!  And  while  at  any  instant  may  arrive — 
humph — that  other  fool." 

Even  this  did  not  draw  the  reader's  glance.  "No." 
she  responded.  "  He  cannot.  Irby  and  Charlie  lied  to 
us.  He  is  already  here."  She  was  re-reading. 

The  grandmother  stared,  tossed  a  hand  and  moved 
across  the  floor.  As  she  passed  near  the  girl's  slippered 
foot  it  darted  out,  tripped  her  and  would  have  sent 
her  headlong,  but  she  caught  by  the  lamp  table.  Flora 
smiled  with  a  strange  whiteness  round  the  lips.  Mad 
ame  righted  the  shaken  lamp,  quietly  asking,  "Did 
you  do  that — h-m-m — for  hate  of  the  lady,  or,  eh,  the 
ladies'  man?" 

"The  latter,"  said  the  reabsorbed  girl. 

"Strange,"  sighed  the  other,  "how  we  can  have — at 
the  same  time — for  the  same  one — both  feelings." 

But  Flora's  ears  were  closed.  "Well,"  she  audibly 
mused,  "he'll  get  a  recall." 

"  Even  if  it  must  be  forged  ?  "  twittered  the  dame. 


Kincaid's  Battery 

XXXVIII 
ANNA'S  OLD  JEWELS 

A  REPORTERS'  heaven,  the  Bazaar.  So  on  its  open 
ing  night  Hilary  named  it  to  Flora. 

"A  faerye  realm,"  the  scribes  themselves  itemed  it; 
"myriad  lights — broad  staircases  gracef'y  asc'd'g — 
ravish'g  perfumes — met  our  gaze — garlandries  of 
laurel  and  magn'a — prom'd'g  from  room  to  room — 
met  our  gaze — directed  by  masters  of  cerem'y  in 
Conf'te  G'd's  unif'm — here  turn'g  to  the  right — fair 
women  and  brave  men — carried  thither  by  the  dense 
throng — music  with  its  volup's  swell — met  our  gaze 
— again  descend'g — arriv'g  at  din'g-hall — new  scene  of 
ench't  bursts — refr't  tables — enarched"  with  ev'gr's  and 
decked  with  labarums  and  burgees — thence  your  way 
lies  through — costly  volumes  and  shimm'g  bijoutries 
— met  our  gaze'" 

It  was  Kincaid  who  saw  their  laborious  office  in  this 
flippant  light,  and  so  presented  it  to  Anna  that  she 
laughed  till  she  wept;  laughing  was  now  so  easy. 
But  when  they  saw  one  of  the  pencillers  writing  awk 
wardly  with  his  left  hand,  aided  by  half  a  right  arm  in 
a  pinned-up  sleeve,  her  mirth  had  a  sudden  check. 
Yet  presently  it  became  a  proud  thrill,  as  the  poor  boy 
glowed  with  delight  while  Hilary  stood  and  talked  with 
him  of  the  fearful  Virginia  day  on  which  that  ruin  had 
befallen  him  at  Hilary's  own  side  in  Kincaii's  Battery, 
and  then  brought  him  to  converse  with  her.  Thio  inci 
dent  may  account  for  the  fervor  with  which  a  next 
morning's  report  extolled  the  wonders  of  the  "fair 

196 


Anna's  Old  Jewels 

chairman's"  administrative  skill  and  the  matchless  and 
most  opportune  executive  supervision  of  Captain  Hilary 
Kincaid.  Flora  read  it  with  interest. 

With  interest  of  a  different  kind  she  read  in  a  later 
issue  another  passage,  handed  her  by  the  grandmother 
with  the  remark,  "  to  warn  you,  my  dear."  The  matter 
was  a  frothy  bit  of  tragical  romancing,  purporting  to 
have  been  gathered  from  two  detectives  out  of  their 
own  experience  of  a  year  or  so  before,  about  a  gift  made 
to  the  Bazaar  by  Captain  Kincaid,  which  had — "met 
our  gaze  jealously  guarded  under  glass  amid  a  brilliant 
collection  of  reliques,  jewels,  and  bric-a-brac;  a  large, 
evil-looking  knife  still  caked  with  the  mud  of  the  deadly 
affray,  but  bearing  legibly  in  Italian  on  its  blade  the 
inscription,  'He  who  gets  me  in  his  body  never  need 
take  a  medicine/  and  with  a  hilt  and  scabbard  en 
crusted  with  gems." 

Now,  one  of  the  things  that  made  Madame  Valcour 
good  company  among  gentlewomen  was  her  authorita 
tive  knowledge  of  precious  stones.  So  when  Flora 
finished  reading  and  looked  up,  and  the  grandmother 
faintly  smiled  and  shook  her  head,  both  understood. 

"Paste?" 

"Mostly." 

"And  the  rest— not  worth ?" 

"Your  stealing,"  simpered  the  connoisseur,  and, 
reading,  herself,  added  meditatively,  "I  should  hate 
anyhow,  for  you  to  have  that  thing.  The  devil  would 
be  always  at  your  ear." 

"  Whispering— what  ?" 

The  grandmother  shrugged:  "That  depends.  I 
look  to  see  you  rise,  yet,  to  some  crime  of  dignity;  some- 

197 


Kincaid's  Battery 

thing  really  tragic  and  Italian.  Whereas  at  present — " 
she  pursed  her  lips  and  shrugged  again. 

The  girl  blandly  laughed:  "You  venerable  in- 
grate!" 

At  the  Bazaar  that  evening,  when  Charlie  and  grand 
ma  and  the  crowd  were  gone,  Flora  handled  the 
unlovely  curiosity.  She  and  Irby  had  seen  Hilary  and 
Anna  and  the  Hyde  &  Goodrich  man  on  guard  just 
there  draw  near  the  glass  case  where  it  lay  "like  a 
snake  on  a  log,"  as  Charlie  had  said,  take  it  in  their 
hands  and  talk  of  it.  The  jeweller  was  expressing  con 
fidentially  a  belief  that  it  had  once  been  set  with  real 
stones,  and  Hilary  was  privately  having  a  sudden 
happy  thought,  when  Flora  and  Adolphe  came  up 
only  in  time  to  hear  the  goldsmith's  statement  of  its 
present  poor  value. 

"  But  surely,"  said  Kincaid,  "  this  old  jewellery  lying 
all  about  it  here " 

"That?  that's  the  costliest  gift  in  the  Bazaar!" 

Irby  inquired  whose  it  was,  Anna  called  it  anony 
mous,  and  Flora,  divining  that  the  giver  was  Anna,  felt 
herself  outrageously  robbed.  As  the  knife  was  being 
laid  back  in  place  she  recalled,  with  odd  interest,  her 
grandmother's  mention  of  the  devil,  and  remembered  a 
time  or  two  when  for  a  moment  she  had  keenly  longed 
for  some  such  bit  of  steel;  something  much  more 
slender,  maybe,  and  better  fitting  a  dainty  hand,  but 
quite  as  long  and  sharp.  A  wave  from  this  thought 
may  have  prompted  Anna's  request  that  the  thing  be 
brought  forth  again  and  Flora  allowed  to  finger  it;  but 
while  this  was  being  done  Flora's  main  concern  was  to 
note  how  the  jeweller  worked  the  hidden  spring  by 

198 


Anna's  Old  Jewels 

which  he  opened  the  glass  case.  As  she  finally  gave  up 
the  weapon:  "Thank  you,"  she  sweetly  said  to  both 
Anna  and  Hilary,  but  with  a  meaning  reserved  to 
herself. 

You  may  remember  how  once  she  had  gone  feeling 
and  prying  along  the  fair  woodwork  of  these  rooms  for 
any  secret  of  construction  it  might  hold.  Lately,  when 
the  house  began  to  fill  with  secretable  things  of  large 
money  value,  she  had  done  this  again,  and  this  time,  in 
one  side  of  a  deep  chimney-breast,  had  actually  found 
a  most  innocent-looking  panel  which  she  fancied  to  be 
kept  from  sliding  only  by  its  paint.  Now  while  she 
said  her  sweet  thanks  to  Anna  and  Hilary  she  could 
almost  believe  in  fairies,  the  panel  was  so  near  the  store 
of  old  jewels.  With  the  knife  she  might  free  the  panel, 
and  behind  the  panel  hide  the  jewels  till  their  scent 
grew  cold,  to  make  them  her  bank  account  when  all 
the  banks  should  be  broken,  let  the  city  fall  or  stand. 
No  one  need  ever  notice,  so  many  were  parting  with 
their  gems  perforce,  so  many  buying  them  as  a  form 
of  asset  convenient  for  flight.  So  good-night,  old 
dagger  and  jewels;  see  you  again,  but  don't  overdo 
your  limited  importance.  Of  the  weapon  Flora  had 
further  learned  that  it  was  given  not  to  the  Bazaar  but 
to  Anna,  and  of  the  jewels  that  they  were  not  in  that 
lottery  of  everything,  with  which  the  affair  was  to  end 
and  the  proceeds  of  whose  tickets  were  pouring  in  upon 
Anna,  acting  treasurer,  the  treasurer  being  ill. 

Tormentingly  in  Hilary's  way  was  this  Lottery  and 
Bazaar.  Even  from  Anna,  sometimes  especially  from 
Anna,  he  could  not  understanc  why  certain  things  must 
not  be  told  or  certain  things  could  not  be  done  until 

199 


KincaicTs  Battery 

this  Bazaar — etc.  Why,  at  any  hour  he  might  be 
recalled!  Yes,  Anna  saw  that — through  very  moist 
eyes.  True,  also,  she  admitted,  Beauregard  and  Johns 
ton  might  fail  to  hold  off  Buelland  Grant;  and  true,  as 
well,  New  Orleans  could  fall,  and  might  be  sacked.  It 
was  while  confessing  this  that  with  eyes  down  and 
bosom  heaving  she  accepted  the  old  Italian  knife. 
Certainly  unless  the  pooh-poohing  Mandeville  was 
wrong,  who  declared  the  forts  down  the  river  impreg 
nable  and  Beauregard,  on  the  Tennessee,  invincible, 
flight  (into  the  Confederacy)  was  safest — but — the 
Bazaar  first,  flight  afterward.  "We  women,"  she  said, 
rising  close  before  him  with  both  hands  in  his,  "must 
stand  by  our  guns.  We've  no  more  right" — it  was 
difficult  to  talk  while  he  kissed  her  fingers  and  pressed 
her  palms  to  his  gray  breast — "no  more  right — to  be 
cowards — than  you  men." 

Her  touch  brought  back  his  lighter  mood  and  he  told 
the  happy  thought — project — which  had  come  to  him 
while  they  talked  with  the  jeweller.  He  could  himself 
"do  the  job,"  he  said,  "roughly  but  well  enough." 
Anna  smiled  at  the  fanciful  scheme.  Yet — yes,  its 
oddity  was  in  its  favor.  So  many  such  devices  were 
succeeding,  some  of  them  to  the  vast  advantage  of  the 
Southern  cause. 

.  When  Flora  the  next  evening  stole  a  passing  glance 
at  the  ugly  trinket  in  its  place  she  was  pleased  to  note 
how  well  it  retained  its  soilure  of  clay.  For  she  had 
that  day  used  it  to  free  the  panel,  behind  which  she  had 
found  a  small  recess  so  fitted  to  her  want  that  she  had 
only  to  replace  panel  an  1  tool  and  await  some  chance 
in  the  closing  hours  of  the  show.  Pleased  she  was,  too, 

200 


Tight  Pinch 

to  observe  that  the  old  jewels  lay  in  a  careless  heap. 
Now  to  conceal  all  interest  and  to  divert  all  eyes,  even 
grandmama's!  Thus,  however,  night  after  night  an 
odd  fact  eluded  her:  That  Anna  and  her  hero,  always 
singly,  and  themselves  careful  to  lure  others  away, 
glimpsed  that  disordered  look  of  the  gems  and  un 
molested  air  of  the  knife  with  a  content  as  purposeful  as 
her  own.  Which  fact  meant,  when  came  the  final  even 
ing,  that  at  last  every  sham  jewel  in  the  knife's  sheath 
had  exchanged  places  with  a  real  one  from  the  loose 
heap,  while,  nestling  between  two  layers  of  the  sheath's 
material,  reposed,  payable  to  bearer,  a  check  on  London 
for  thousands  of  pounds  sterling.  Very  proud  was 
Anna  of  her  lover's  tremendous  versatility  and  crafts 
manship. 

XXXIX 

TIGHT    PINCH 

FROM  Camp  Viller£,  close  below  small  Camp  Cal- 
lender,  one  more  last  regiment — Creoles — was  to  have 
gone  that  afternoon  to  the  Jackson  Railroad  Station 
and  take  train  to  join  their  Creole  Beauregard  for  the 
defence  of  their  own  New  Orleans. 

More  than  a  day's  and  a  night's  journey  away  was 
"Corinth,"  the  village  around  which  he  had  gathered 
his  forces,  but  every  New  Orleans  man  and  boy  among 
them  knew,  and  every  mother  and  sister  here  in  New 
Orleans  knew,  that  as  much  with  those  men  and  boys 
as  with  any  one  anywhere,  lay  the  defence  and  deliver 
ance  of  this  dear  Crescent  City.  With  Grant  swept 
back  from  the  Tennessee,  and  the  gunboats  that 

201 


Kincaid's  Battery 

threatened  Island  Ten  and  Memphis  sunk,  blown  up, 
or  driven  back  into  the  Ohio,  New  Orleans,  they  be 
lieved,  could  jeer  at  Farragut  down  at  the  Passes  and  at 
Butler  out  on  horrid  Ship  Island.  "And  so  can  Mobile," 
said  the  Callenders  to  the  Valcours. 

"The  fortunes  of  our  two  cities  are  one!"  cried  Con 
stance,  and  the  smiling  Valcours  were  inwardly  glad  to 
assent,  believing  New  Orleans  doomed,  and  remember 
ing  their  Mobile  home  burned  for  the  defence  of  the  two 
cities  of  one  fortune. 

However,  the  Camp  Villere'  regiment  had  not  got  off, 
but  would  move  at  midnight.  On  the  train  with  them 
Hilary  was  sending  recruits  to  the  battery,  younger 
brothers  of  those  who  had  gone  the  year  before.  He 
had  expected  to  conduct,  not  send,  them,  but  important 
work  justified — as  Anna  told  Flora — his  lingering  until 
his  uncle  should  bid  him  come.  Which  bidding  Irby 
might  easily  have  incited,  by  telegraph,  had  Flora  let 
him.  But  Flora's  heart  was  too  hopelessly  entangled 
to  release  Hilary  even  for  the  gain  of  separating  him 
from  Anna;  and  because  it  was  so  entangled  (and  with 
her  power  to  plot  caught  in  the  tangle),  she  was  learning 
to  hate  with  a  distemper  of  passion  that  awed  even 
herself. 

"  But  I  must  clear  out  mighty  soon,"  said  Hilary  that 
evening  to  Greenleaf,  whose  exchange  he  had  procured 
at  last  and,  rather  rashly,  was  taking  him  to  Callender 
House  to  say  good-by.  They  talked  of  Anna.  Green- 
leaf  knew  the  paramount  secret;  had  bravely  given  his 
friend  a  hand  on  it  the  day  he  was  told.  Now  Hilary 
said  he  had  been  begging  her  again  for  practical  steps, 
and  the  manly  loser  commended. 

202 


Tight  Pinch 

"  But  think  of  that  from  me,  Fred !  who  one  year  ago 
— you  know  how  I  talked — about  Steve,  for  instance. 
Shame ! — how  reckless  war's  made  us.  Here  we  are,  by 
millions,  in  a  perpetual  crash  of  victory  and  calamity, 
and  yet — take  me  for  an  example — in  spite  of  me  my 
one  devouring  anxiety — that  wakes  me  up  in  the  night 
and  gives  me  dreams  in  the  day — is  how  to  get  her 
before  this  next  battle  get's  me.  Yes,  the  instant  I'm 
ordered  I  go,  and  if  I'm  not  ordered  soon  I  go  anyhow. 
I  wouldn't  have  my  boys" — etc. 

And  still  the  prison-blanched  Greenleaf  approved. 
But  the  next  revelation  reddened  his  brow:  Anna, 
Hilary  said,  had  at  last  "come  round — knuckled  down! 
Yes,  sir-ee,  cav-ed  in!"  and  this  evening,  after  the 
Bazaar,  to  a  few  younger  sisters  of  the  battery  whom 
she  would  ask  to  linger  for  a  last  waltz  with  their  young 
heroes,  she  would  announce  her  engagement  and  her 
purpose  to  be  wed  in  a  thrillingly  short  time. 

The  two  men  found  the  Bazaar  so  amusingly  col 
lapsed  that,  as  Hilary  said,  you  could  spell  it  with  a 
small  b.  A  stream  of  vehicles  coming  and  going  had 
about  emptied  the  house  and  grounds.  No  sentries 
saluted,  no  music  chimed.  In  the  drawing-rooms  the 
brass  gun  valiantly  held  its  ground,  but  one  or  two 
domestics  clearing  litter  from  the  floors  seemed  quite 
alone  there,  and  some  gay  visitors  who  still  tarried  in 
the  library  across  the  hall  were  hardly  enough  to  crowd 
it.  "  Good,"  said  Hilary  beside  the  field-piece.  "  You 
wait  here  and  I'll  bring  the  Callenders  as  they  can 
come." 

But  while  he  went  for  them  whom  should  Greenleaf 
light  upon  around  a  corner  of  the  panelled  chimney- 

203 


Kincaid's  Battery 

breast  but  that  secret  lover  of  the  Union  and  all  its  de 
fenders,  Mademoiselle  Valcour.  Her  furtive  cordiality 
was  charming  as  she  hurriedly  gave  and  withdrew  a 
hand  in  joy  for  his  liberation. 

"Taking  breath  out  of  the  social  rapids ?"  he  softly 
inquired. 

"Ah,  more!     'Tis  from  that  deluge  of " 

He  understood  her  emotional  gesture.  It  meant  that 
deluge  of  disloyalty — rebellion — there  across  the  hall, 
and  all  through  this  turbulent  city  and  land.  But  it 
meant,  too,  that  they  must  not  be  seen  to  parley  alone, 
and  he  had  turned  away,  when  Miranda,  to  Flora's 
disgust,  tripped  in  upon  them  with  her  nose  in  full 
wrinkle,  archly  surprised  to  see  Flora  here,  and  pro 
posing  to  hale  both  into  the  general  throng  to  applaud 
Anna's  forthcoming  "proclamation!" 

Greenleaf  de  trop?  Ah,  nay!  not  if  he  could  keep 
the  old  Greenleaf  poise!  and  without  words  her  merry 
nose  added  that  his  presence  would  only  give  happier 
point  to  what  every  one  regarded  as  a  great  Confederate 
victory.  At  a  subtle  sign  from  Flora  the  hostess  and  he 
went,  expecting  her  to  follow. 

But  Flora  was  in  a  perilous  strait.  Surprised  by 
Hilary's  voice,  with  the  panel  open  and  the  knife  laid 
momentarily  in  the  recess  that  both  hands  might  bring 
the  jewels  from  the  case,  she  had  just  closed  the  opening 
with  the  dagger  inside  when  Greenleaf  confronted  her. 
Now,  in  this  last  instant  of  opportunity  at  his  and 
Miranda's  back,  should  she  only  replace  the  weapon  or 
still  dare  the  theft  ?  At  any  rate  the  panel  must  be  re 
opened.  But  when  she  would  have  slid  it  her  dainty 
fingers  failed,  failed,  failed  until  a  cold  damp  came  to 

204 


Tight  Pinch 

her  brow  and  she  trembled.  Yet  saunteringly  she 
stepped  to  the  show-case,  glancing  airily  about.  The 
servants  had  gone.  She  glided  back,  but  turned  to 
meet  another  footfall,  possibly  Kincaid's,  and  felt  her 
anger  rise  against  her  will  as  she  confronted  only  the 
inadequate  Irby.  A  sudden  purpose  filled  her,  and 
before  he  could  speak: 

"Go!"  she  said,  " telegraph  your  uncle!  instantly!" 

"I've  done  so." 

Her  anger  mutinied  again:  "Without  consult' — ! 
And  since  when?" 

"This  morning." 

She  winced  yet  smiled :  "  And  still — your  cousin — he 
*s  receive'  no  order?"  Her  fingers  tingled  to  maim 
some  one — this  dolt — anybody!  Her  eyes  sweetened. 

Irby  spoke:  "The  order  has  come,  but " 

"What!  you  have  not  given  it?" 

"Flora,  it  includes  me!  Ah,  for  one  more  evening 
with  you  I  am  risking " 

Her  look  grew  fond  though  she  made  a  gesture 
of  despair:  "Oh,  short-sighted!  Go,  give  it  him! 
Go!" 

Across  the  hall  a  prolonged  carol  of  acclamation, 
confabulation,  laughter,  and  cries  of  "Ah-r,  indeed!" 
told  that  Anna's  word  was  out.  "What  difference," 
Irby  lingered  to  ask,  "can  an  hour  or  two  between 
trains ?" 

But  the  throng  was  upon  them.  "We  don't  know!" 
cried  Flora.  "Give  it  him!  We  don't  know!"  and 
barely  had  time  herself  to  force  a  light  laugh  when  here 
were  Charlie  and  Victorine,  Hilary,  Anna,  Miranda, 
Madame,  Constance,  Mandeville,  and  twenty  others. 

205 


KincaicTs  Battery 

"Fred!"  called  Hilary.  His  roaming  look  found  the 
gray  detective:  "Where's  Captain  Greenleaf ?" 

"  Gone." 

"  With  never  a  word  of  good-by  ?  Oh,  bless  my  soul, 
he  did  say  good-by!"  There  was  a  general  laugh. 
"  But  this  won't  do.  It's  not  safe  for  him " 

The  gray  man  gently  explained  that  his  younger 
associate  was  with  Greenleaf  as  bodyguard.  The 
music  of  harp  and  violins  broke  out  and  dancers  swept 
round  the  brass  gun  and  up  and  down  the  floors. 


XL 

THE    LICENSE,    THE    DAGGER 

HILARY  had  bent  an  arm  around  Anna  when  Flora 
called  his  name.  Irby  handed  him  the  order.  A 
glance  made  it  clear.  Its  reader  cast  a  wide  look  over 
the  heads  of  the  dancers  and  lifting  the  missive  high 
beckoned  with  it  to  Mandeville.  Then  he  looked  for 
some  one  else:  "Charlie!" 

"  Out  on  the  veranda,"  said  a  passing  dancer. 

"Send  him  here!"  The  commander's  eye  came 
back  to  Irby:  "  Old  man,  how  long  have  you  had  this  ? " 

"About  an  hour." 

"Oh,  my  stars,  Adolphe,  you  should  have  told  me!" 

It  was  a  fair  sight,  though  maddening  to  Flora  yonder 
by  the  glass  case,  to  see  the  two  cousins  standing  eye  to 
eye,  Hilary's  brow  dark  with  splendid  concern  while 
without  a  glance  at  Anna  he  passed  her  the  despatch 
and  she  read  it. 

"Steve,"  he  said,  as  the  Mandeville  pair  pressed  up, 
206 


The  License,  The  Dagger 

"look  at  that!  boots-and-saddles !  now!  to-night!  for 
you  and  Adolphe  and  me!  Yes,  Charlie,  and  you; 
go,  get  your  things  and  put  Jerry  on  the  train  with 
mine." 

The  boy's  partner  was  Victorine.  Before  she  could 
gasp  he  had  kissed  her.  Amid  a  laugh  that  stopped 
half  the  dance  he  waved  one  farewell  to  sister,  grand 
mother  and  all  and  sprang  away.  "  Dance  on,  fellows," 
called  Hilary,  "this  means  only  that  I'm  going  with 
you."  The  lads  cheered  and  the  dance  revived. 

Their  captain  turned:  "Miss  Flora,  I  promised  your 
brother  he  should  go  whenever " 

"But  me  al-s0  you  promised!"  she  interrupted,  and 
a  fair  sight  also,  grievous  to  Irby,  startling  to  Anna,  were 
this  pair,  standing  eye  to  eye. 

"  Yes,"  replied  Kincaid,  "  and  I'll  keep  my  word.  In 
any  extremity  you  shall  come  to  him." 

"As  likewise  my  wive  to  me!"  said  the  swelling 
Mandeville,  openly  caressing  the  tearful  Constance. 
"  Wive  to  'usband,  "  he  declaimed,  "  sizter  to  brother — " 
But  his  audience  was  lost.  Hilary  was  speaking 
softly  to  Anna.  She  was  very  pale.  The  throng  drew 
away.  You  could  see  that  he  was  asking  if  she  only 
could  in  no  extremity  come  to  him.  His  words  were 
inaudible,  but  any  one  who  had  ever  loved  could  read 
them.  And  now  evidently  he  proposed  something. 
There  was  ardor  in  his  eye — ardor  and  enterprise. 
She  murmured  a  response.  He  snatched  out  his  watch. 

"Just  time,"  he  was  heard  to  say,  "time  enough  by 
soldier's  measure!"  His  speech  grew  plainer:  "The 
law's  right  for  me  to  cafl  and  for  you  to  come,  that's  all 
we  want.  What  frightens  you?" 

207 


KincaicTs  Battery 

"Nothing,"  she  said,  and  smiled.  "I  only  feared 
there  wasn't  time." 

The  lover  faced  his  cousin  so  abruptly  that  all  started 
and  laughed,  while  Anna  turned  to  her  kindred,  as 
red  as  a  rose.  "  Adolphe,"  cried  he,  "I'm  going  for  my 
marriage  license.  While  I'm  getting  it,  will  you ?  " 

Irby  went  redder  than  Anna.  "You  can't  get  it  at 
this  hour!"  he  said.  His  eyes  sought  Flora,  but  she 
was  hurriedly  conferring  with  her  grandmother. 

Hilary  laughed :  "  You'll  see.  I  fixed  all  that  a  week 
ago.  Will  you  get  the  minister?" 

"Why,  Hilary,  this  is " 

"Yass!"  piped  Madame,  "he'll  obtain  him!" 

The  plaudits  of  the  dancers,  who  once  more  had 
stopped,  were  loud.  Flora's  glance  went  over  to  Irby, 
and  he  said,  "Why,  yes,  Hilary,  if  you — why,  of  course 
I  will."  There  was  more  applause. 

"Steve,"  said  Hilary,  "some  one  must  go  with  me  to 
the  clerk's  office  to " 

"To  vouch  you!"  broke  in  the  aide-de-camp.  "That 
will  be  Steve  Mandeville!"  Constance  sublimely  ap 
proved.  As  the  three  Callenders  moved  to  leave  the 
room  one  way  and  the  three  captains  another,  Anna 
seized  the  hands  of  Flora  and  her  grandmother. 

"You'll  keep  the  dance  going?"  she  solicited,  and 
they  said  they  would.  Flora  gave  her  a  glowing  em 
brace,  and  as  Irby  strode  by  murmured  to  him. 

"Put  your  watch  back  half  an  hour." 

In  such  disordered  days  social  liberty  was  large. 
When  the  detective,  after  the  Callenders  were  gone  up 
stairs  and  the  captains  had  galloped  away,  truthfully 
told  Miss  Valcour  that  his  only  object  in  tarrying  here 

208 


The  License,  The  Dagger 

was  to  see  the  love-knot  tied,  she  heard  him  affably, 
though  inwardly  in  flames  of  yearning  to  see  him  depart. 
She  burned  to  see  him  go  because  she  believed  him,  and 
also  because  there  in  the  show-case  still  lay  the  loosely 
heaped  counterfeit  of  the  booty  whose  reality  she  had 
already  ignorantly  taken  and  stowed  away. 

What  should  she  do  ?  Here  was  grandma,  better  aid 
than  forty  Irbys;  but  with  both  phases  of  her  problem 
to  deal  with  at  once — how  to  trip  headlong  this  wild 
matrimonial  leap  and  how  to  seize  this  treasure  by 
whose  means  she  might  leave  Anna  in  a  fallen  city  and 
follow  Hilary  to  the  war — she  was  at  the  end  of  her 
daintiest  wits.  She  talked  on  with  the  gray  man,  for 
that  kept  him  from  the  show-case.  In  an  air  full  of 
harmonies  and  prattle,  of  fluttering  draperies,  gliding 
feet,  undulating  shoulders,  twinkling  lights,  gallantry, 
fans,  and  perfume,  she  dazzled  him  with  her  approval 
when  he  enlarged  on  the  merits  of  Kincaid  and  when 
he  pledged  all  his  powers  of  invention  to  speed  the 
bridal.  Frantic  to  think  what  better  to  do,  she  waltzed 
with  him,  while  he  described  the  colonel  of  the  departing 
regiment  as  such  a  martinet  that  to  ask  him  to  delay 
his  going  would  only  hasten  it;  waltzed  on  when  she 
saw  her  grandmother  discover  the  knife's  absence  and 
telegraph  her  a  look  of  contemptuous  wonder.  But  ah, 
how  time  was  flying!  Even  now  Kincaid  must  be  re 
turning  hitherward,  licensed! 

The  rapturous  music  somewhat  soothed  her  frenzy, 
even  helped  her  thought,  and  in  a  thirst  for  all  it  could 
give  she  had  her  partner  swing  her  into  the  wide  hall 
whence  it  came  and  where  also  Hilary  must  first  re 
appear.  Twice  through  its  length  they  had  swept, 

209 


Kincaid's  Battery 

when  Anna,  in  altered  dress,  came  swiftly  down  the 
stair  with  Constance  protestingly  at  her  side.  The  two 
were  speaking  anxiously  together  as  if  a  choice  of  nuptial 
adornments  (for  Constance  bore  a  box  that  might  have 
held  the  old  jewels)  had  suddenly  brought  to  mind  a 
forgotten  responsibility.  As  they  pressed  into  the 
drawing-rooms  the  two  dancers  floated  after  them  by 
another  door. 

When  presently  Flora  halted  beside  the  gun  and 
fanned  while  the  dance  throbbed  on,  the  two  sisters 
stood  a  few  steps  away  behind  the  opened  show-case, 
talking  with  her  grandmother  and  furtively  eyed  by  a 
few  bystanders.  They  had  missed  the  dagger.  Strangely 
disregarded  by  Anna,  but  to  Flora's  secret  dismay  and 
rage,  Constance,  as  she  talked,  was  dropping  from  her 
doubled  hands  into  the  casket  the  last  of  the  gems. 
Now  she  shut  the  box  and  laid  it  in  Anna's  careless  arms. 

Leaving  the  gray  man  by  the  gun,  Flora  sprang  near. 
Anna  was  enduring,  with  distracted  smiles,  the  eager 
reasonings  of  Madame  and  Constance  that  the  vanished 
trinket  was  but  borrowed ;  a  thief  would  have  taken  the 
jewels,  they  argued ;  but  as  Flora  would  have  joined  in, 
every  line  of  Anna's  face  suddenly  confided  to  her  a 
consternation  whose  cause  the  silenced  Flora  instantly 
mistook.  "Ah,  if  you  knew — !"  Anna  began,  but 
ceased  as  if  the  lost  relic  stood  for  something  incom 
municable  even  to  nearest  and  dearest. 

"They've  sworn  their  love  on  it!"  was  the  thought  of 
Flora  and  the  detective  in  the  same  instant.  It  filled 
her  veins  with  fury,  yet  her  response  was  gentle  and 
meditative.  "To  me,"  she  said,  "it  seemed  such  a 
good-for-nothing  that  even  if  I  saw  it  is  gone,  me,  I 

210 


For  an  Emergency 

think  I  would  n'  have  take'  notice."  All  at  once  she 
brightened:  "Anna!  without  a  doubt!  without  a  doubt 
Captain  Kincaid  he  has  it!"  About  to  add  a  caress, 
she  was  startled  from  it  by  a  masculine  voice  that  gayly 
echoed  out  in  the  hall: 

"Without  a  doubt!" 

The  dance  ceased  and  first  the  short,  round  body  of 
Mandeville  and  then  the  tall  form  of  Hilary  Kincaid 
pushed  into  the  room.  "Without  a  doubt!"  repeated 
Hilary,  while  Mandeville  asked  right,  asked  left,  for 
Adolphe.  "Without  a  doubt,"  persisted  the  lover, 
"Captain  Kincaid  he  has  it!"  and  proffered  Anna  the 
law's  warrant  for  their  marriage. 

She  pushed  it  away.  Her  words  were  so  low  that  but 
few  could  hear.  "The  dagger!"  she  said.  "Haven't 
you  got  the  dagger?  You  haven't  got  it?" 

XLI 

FOR  AN  EMERGENCY 

HILARY  stared,  reddened  as  she  paled,  and  with  a 
slow  smile  shook  his  head.  She  murmured  again: 

"It's  lost!  the  dagger!  with  all " 

"Why, — why,  Miss  Anna," — his  smile  grew  playful, 
but  his  thought  ran  back  to  the  exploded  powder-mill, 
to  the  old  inventor,  to  Flora  in  those  days,  the  deported 
schoolmistress's  gold  still  unpaid  to  him,  the  jeweller 
and  the  exchanged  gems,  the  Sterling  bill — "  Why,  Miss 
Anna!  how  do  you  mean,  lost?" 

"Taken!  gone!  and  by  my  fault!  I — I  jorgot  all 
about  it" 

211 


Kincaid's  Battery 

He  laughed  aloud  and  around:  "Pshaw!  Now, 
ladies  and  gentlemen,  this  is  some  joke  you're" — he 
glanced  toward  the  show-case 

"No,"  insisted  Anna,  "it's  taken!  Here  are  the 
other  things."  She  displayed  the  box. 

Madame,  very  angry,  smiled  from  it  to  Flora:  "Oh, 
thou  love's  fool!  not  to  steal  that  and  leave  the  knife, 
with  which,  luckily!  now  that  you  have  it,  you  dare  not 
strike!" 

All  this  the  subtle  girl  read  in  the  ancient  lady's  one 
small  "ahem!"  and  for  reply,  in  some  even  more 
unvoiced  way,  warned  her  against  the  eye  of  the  gray 
man  near  the  gun.  To  avoid  whose  scrutiny  herself 
she  returned  sociably  to  his  side. 

"The  other  things!"  scoffed  meantime  the  gay 
Hilary,  catching  up  Anna's  word.  "No!  if  you  please, 
here  is  the  only  other  thing!"  and  boyishly  flaunted  the 
license  at  Mandeville  and  all  the  Callenders,  the  throng 
merrily  approving.  His  eye,  falling  upon  the  detective, 
kindled  joyfully:  "Oh,  you  godsend!  You  hunt  up  the 
lost  frog-sticker,  will  you — while  we — ?"  He  flour 
ished  the  document  again  and  the  gray  man  replied 
with  a  cordial  nod.  Kincaid  waved  thanks  and  glanced 
round.  "Adolphe!"  he  called.  "Steve,  where  in  the 
dickens ?" 

Whether  he  so  designed  it  or  not,  the  contrast  be 
tween  his  levity  and  Anna's  agitation  convinced  Flora, 
Madame,  all,  that  the  weapon's  only  value  to  the  lovers 
was  sentimental.  "Or  religious,"  thought  the  detec 
tive,  whose  adjectives  could  be  as  inaccurate  as  his 
divinations.  While  he  conjectured,  Anna  spoke  once 
more  to  Hilary.  Her  vehement  words  were  too  soft 

212 


For  an  Emergency 

for  any  ear  save  his,  but  their  tenor  was  so  visible,  her 
distress  so  passionate  and  her  firmness  of  resolve  so 
evident  that  every  mere  beholder  fell  back,  letting  the 
Callender-Valcour  group,  with  Steve  and  the  gentle 
detective,  press  closer.  With  none  of  them,  nor  yet 
with  Hilary,  was  there  anything  to  argue;  their  plight 
seemed  to  her  hopeless.  For  them  to  marry,  for  her  to 
default,  and  for  him  to  fly,  all  in  one  mad  hour — one 
whirlwind  of  incident — "It  cannot  be!"  was  all  she 
could  say,  to  sister,  to  stepmother,  to  Flora,  to  Hilary 
again:  "We  cannot  do  it!  I  will  not! — till  that  lost 
thing  is  found!" 

With  keen  sympathy  the  detective,  in  the  pack,  en 
joyed  the  play  of  Hilary's  face,  where  martial  animation 
strove  inspiringly  against  a  torture  of  dashed  hopes. 
Glancing  aside  to  Flora's  as  she  turned  from  Anna, 
he  caught  there  no  sign  of  the  storm  of  joy  which  had 
suddenly  burst  in  her  bosom;  but  for  fear  he  might, 
and  to  break  across  his  insight  and  reckoning,  she 
addressed  him. 

"Anna  she  don't  give  any  reason"  she  exclaimed. 
"Ask  her,  you,  the  reason!" 

"'Tain't  reason  at  all,"  he  softly  responded,  "it's 
superstition.  But  hold  on.  Watch  me."  He  gest 
ured  for  the  lover's  attention  and  their  eyes  met.  It 
made  a  number  laugh,  to  see  Hilary's  stare  gradually 
go  senseless  and  then  blaze  with  intelligence.  Sud 
denly,  joyfully,  with  every  eye  following  his  finger,  he 
pointed  into  the  gray  man's  face: 

"Smellemout,  you've  got  it!" 

The  man  shook  his  head  for  denial,  and  his  kindly 
twinkle  commanded  the  belief  of  all.  Not  a  glint  in  it 

213 


Kincaid's  Battery 

showed  that  his  next  response,  however  well-meant, 
was  to  be  a  lie. 

"Then  Ketchem  has  it!"  cried  Kincaid. 

The  silent  man  let  his  smile  mean  yes,  and  the  alert 
company  applauded.  "Go  h-on  with  the  weddingg!" 
ordered  the  superior  Mandeville. 

"Where's  Adolphe?"  cried  Kincaid,  and  "On  with 
the  wedding!"  clamored  the  lads  of  the  battery,  while 
Anna  stood  gazing  on  the  gray  man  and  wondering  why 
she  had  not  guessed  this  very  thing. 

"Yes,"  he  quietly  said  to  her,  "it's  all  right.  You'll 
have  it  back  to-morrow.  'Twon't  cut  love  if  you  don't." 

At  that  the  gay  din  redoubled,  but  Flora,  with  the 
little  grandmother  vainly  gripping  her  arms,  flashed 
between  the  two. 

"Anna!"  she  cried,  "I  don't  bil-ieve!" 

Whether  it  was  true  or  false  Mandeville  cared  noth 
ing,  but — "Yes,  't  is  true!"  he  cried  in  Flora's  face,  and 
then  to  the  detective — "Doubtlezz  to  phot-ograph  it 
that's  all  you  want!" 

The  detective  said  little,  but  Anna  assured  Flora  that 
was  all.  "He  wants  to  show  it  at  the  trial!" 

"Listen!"  said  Flora. 

"Here's  Captain  Irby!"  cried  Mrs.  Callender— Con 
stance — half  a  dozen,  but 

"Listen!"  repeated  Flora,  and  across  the  curtained 
veranda  and  in  at  the  open  windows,  under  the  general 
clamor,  came  a  soft  palpitating  rumble.  Did  Hilary 
hear  it,  too  ?  He  was  calling : 

"  Adolphe,  where's  your  man — the  minister  ?     Where 

in  the — three  parishes ?"  and  others  were  echoing, 

"The  minister!  where's  the  minister?" 

214 


For  an  Emergency 

Had  they  also  caught  the  sound  ? 

"  Isn't  he  here  ?  "  asked  Irby.     He  drew  his  watch. 

"Half -hour  slow!"  cried  Mandeville,  reading  it. 

"But  have  you  heard  noth ?" 

"Nothingg!"  roared  Mandeville. 

"  Where'd  you  leave  him?"  sharply  asked  Kincaid. 

His  cousin  put  on  great  dignity:  "At  his  door,  my 
dear  sir,  waiting  for  the  cab  I  sent  him." 

"Oh,  sent!"  cried  half  the  group.  "Steve,"  called 
Kincaid,  "your  horse  is  fresh " 

"  But,  alas,  without  wings!"  wailed  the  Creole,  caught 
Hilary's  shoulder  and  struck  a  barkening  pose. 

"Too  late!"  moaned  Flora  to  the  detective,  Madame 
to  Constance  and  Miranda,  and  the  battery  lads  to 
their  girls,  from  whose  hands  they  began  to  wring  wild 
good-byes  as  a  peal  of  fifes  and  drums  heralded  the  on- 
come  of  the  departing  regiment. 

Thus  Charlie  Valcour  found  the  company  as  sud 
denly  he  reappeared  in  it,  pushing  in  to  the  main  group 
where  his  leader  stood  eagerly  engaged  with  Anna. 

kt  All  right,  Captain ! "  He  saluted :  "  All  done ! "  But 
a  fierce  anxiety  was  on  his  brow  and  he  gave  no  heed 
to  Hilary's  dismissing  thanks:  "Captain,  what's  'too 
late'?"  He  turned,  scowling,  to  his  sister:  "What  are 
we  too  late  for,  Flo?  Good  God!  not  the  wedding? 
Not  your  wedding,  Miss  Anna  ?  It's  not  too  late.  By 
Jove,  it  sha'n't  be  too  late." 

All  the  boyish  lawlessness  of  his  nature  rose  into  his 
eyes,  and  a  boy's  tears  with  it.  "The  minister!"  he 
retorted  to  Constance  and  his  grandmother,  "the  min 
ister  be — Oh,  Captain,  don't  wait  for  him!  Have  the 
thing  without  a  minister!" 

215 


Kincaid's  Battery 

The  whole  room  was  laughing,  Hilary  loudest,  but 
the  youth's  voice  prevailed.  "It'll  hold  good!"  He 
turned  upon  the  detective:  "Won't  it?" 

A  merry  nod  was  the  reply,  with  cries  of  "Yes," 
"Yes,"  from  the  battery  boys,  and  he  clamored  on: 

"Why,  there's  a  kind  of  people " 

"Quakers!"  sang  out  some  one. 

"Yes,  the  Quakers!  Don't  they  do  it  all  the  time! 
Of  course  they  do!"  With  a  smile  in  his  wet  eyes  the 
lad  wheeled  upon  Victorine:  "Oh,  by  S'n'  Peter!  if 
that  was  the  only " 

But  the  small,  compelling  hand  of  the  detective 
faced  him  round  again  and  with  a  sudden  swell  of  the 
general  laugh  he  laughed  too.  "He's  trying  to  behave 
like  Captain  Kincaid,"  one  battery  sister  tried  to  tell 
another,  whose  attention  was  on  a  more  interesting 
matter. 

"  Here !"  the  gray  man  was  amiably  saying  to  Charlie. 
"It's  your  advice  that's  too  late.  Look." 

Before  he  had  half  spoken  a  hush  so  complete  had 
fallen  on  the  company  that  while  every  eye  sought 
Hilary  and  Anna  every  ear  was  aware  that  out  on  the 
levee  road  the  passing  drums  had  ceased  and  the  brass 
— as  if  purposely  to  taunt  the  theatrical  spirit  of  Flora — 
had  struck  up  The  Ladies'  Man.  With  military  curt- 
ness  Kincaid  was  addressing  the  score  or  so  of  new 
cannoneers : 

"Corporal  Valcour,  this  squad — no,  keep  your 
partners,  but  others  please  stand  to  the  right  and  left — 
these  men  are  under  your  command.  When  I  presently 
send  you  from  here  you'll  take  them  at  a  double-quick 
and  close  up  with  that  regiment.  I'll  be  at  the  train 

216 


For  an  Emergency 

when  you  reach  it.  Captain  Mandeville," — he  turned 
to  the  married  pair,  who  were  hurriedly  scanning  the 
license  Miranda  had  just  handed  them, — "I  adjure 
you  as  a  true  and  faithful  citizen  and  soldier,  and  you, 
madam,  as  well,  to  testify  to  us,  all,  whether  that  is  or 
is  not  the  license  of  court  for  the  marriage  of  Anna 
Callender  to  Hilary  Kincaid." 

"It  is!"  eagerly  proclaimed  the  pair. 

"Hand  it,  please,  to  Charlie.  Corporal,  you  and 
your  men  look  it  over." 

"And  now — "  His  eyes  swept  the  throng.  Anna's 
hand,  trembling  but  ready,  rose  shoulder-high  in  his. 
He  noted  the  varied  expressions  of  face  among  the 
family  servants  hurriedly  gathering  in  the  doors,  and 
the  beautiful  amaze  of  Flora,  so  genuine  yet  so  well 
acted.  Radiantly  he  met  the  flushed  gaze  of  his 
speechless  cousin.  "If  any  one  alive,"  he  cried, 
"knows  any  cause  why  this  thing  should  not  be,  let 
him  now  speak  or  forever  hereafter  hold  his  peace." 
He  paused.  Constance  handed  something  to  her  hus 
band. 

"Oh,  go  on,"  murmured  Charlie,  and  many  smiled. 

"Soldiers!"  resumed  the  lover,  "this  fair  godmother 
of  your  flag  agrees  that  for  all  we  two  want  just  now 
Kincaid's  Battery  is  minister  enough.  For  all  we  want 
is "  Cheers  stopped  him. 

"The  prayer-book!"  put  in  Mandeville,  pushing  it 
at  him.  The  boys  harkened  again. 

"No,"  said  Kincaid,  "time's  too  short.  All  we  want 
is  to  bind  ourselves,  before  Heaven  and  all  mankind, 
in  holy  wedlock,  for  better,  or  worse,  till  death  us  do 
part.  And  this  we  here  do  in  sight  of  you  all,  and  in 

217 


KincaicTs  Battery 

the  name  and  sight  and  fear  of  God."  He  dropped 
his  glance  to  Anna's:  " Say  Amen." 

"  Amen,"  said  Anna.  At  the  same  moment  in  one  of 
the  doors  stood  a  courier. 

"  All  right ! "  called  Hilary  to  him.  "  Tell  your  colonel 
we're  coming!  Just  a  second  more,  Captain  Irby,  if 
you  please.  Soldiers! — I,  Hilary,  take  thee,  Anna, 
to  be  my  lawful  wedded  wife.  And  you " 

"I,  Anna,"  she  softly  broke  in,  "take  thee,  Hilary, 

to  be  my "  She  spoke  the  matter  through,  but  he 

had  not  waited. 

" Therefore!"  he  cried,  "you  men  of  Kincaid's  Bat 
tery — and  you,  sir, — and  you," — nodding  right  and  left 
to  Mandeville  and  the  detective, — "on  this  our  solemn 
pledge  to  supply  as  soon  as  ever  we  can  all  form  of  law 
and  social  usage  here  omitted  which  can  more  fully 
solemnize  this  union — do  now " 

Up  went  the  detective's  hand  and  then  Mandeville's 
and  all  the  boys',  and  all  together  said: 

"Pronounce  you  man  and  wife." 

"Go!"  instantly  rang  Kincaid  to  Charlie,  and  in  a 
sudden  flutter  of  gauzes  and  clink  of  trappings,  with 
wringing  of  soft  fingers  by  hard  ones,  and  in  a  tender 
clamor  of  bass  and  treble  voices,  away  sprang  every 
cannoneer  to  knapsacks  and  sabres  in  the  hall,  and 
down  the  outer  stair  into  ranks  and  off  under  the  stars 
at  double-quick.  Sisters  of  the  battery,  gliding  out  to 
the  veranda  rail,  faintly  saw  and  heard  them  a  precious 
moment  longer  as  they  sped  up  the  dusty  road.  Then 
Irby  stepped  quickly  out,  ran  down  the  steps,  mounted 
and  galloped.  A  far  rumble  of  wheels  told  the  coming 
of  two  omnibuses  chartered  to  bear  the  dancers  all,  with 

218 


For  an  Emergency 

the  Valcours  and  the  detective,  to  their  homes.  Now  out 
to  the  steps  came  Mandeville.  His  wife  was  with  him 
and  the  maidens  kindly  went  in.  There  the  detective 
joined  them.  At  a  hall  door  Hilary  was  parting  with 
Madame,  Flora,  Miranda.  Anna  was  near  him  with 
Flora's  arm  about  her  in  melting  fondness.  Now  Con 
stance  rejoined  the  five,  and  now  Hilary  and  Anna 
left  the  other  four  and  passed  slowly  out  to  the  garden 
stair  alone. 

Beneath  them  there,  with  welcoming  notes,  his  lone 
horse  trampled  about  the  hitching-rail.  Dropping  his 
cap  the  master  folded  the  bride's  ha~>ds  in  his  and 
pressed  on  them  a  long  kiss.  The  pair  looked  deeply 
into  each  other's  eyes.  Her  brow  drooped  and  he  laid 
a  kiss  on  it  also.  "Now  you  must  go,"  she  murmured. 

"My  own  beloved!"  was  his  response.  "My  soul's 
mate!"  He  tried  to  draw  her,  but  she  held  back. 

"You  must  go,"  she  repeated. 

"Yes!  kiss  me  ?nd  I  fly."  He  tried  once  more  to 
draw  her  close,  but  still  in  vain. 

"No,  dearest,"  she  whispered,  and  trembled.  Yet 
she  clutched  his  imprisoning  fingers  and  kissed  them. 
He  hugged  her  hands  to  his  breast. 

"Oh,  Hilary,"  she  added,  "I  wish  I  could!  But— 
don't  you  know  why  I  can't  ?  Don't  you  see  ?  " 

"No,  my  treasure,  not  any  more.  Why,  Anna, 
you're  Anna  Kincaid  now.  You're  my  wed' " 

Her  start  of  distress  stopped  him  short.  "Don't 
call  me  that, — my — my  own,"  she  faltered. 

"But  if  you  are  that ?" 

"Oh,  I  am!  thank  God,  I  am!  But  don't  name  the 
name.  It's  too  fearfully  holy.  We're  married  for  an 

219 


Kincaid's  Battery 

emergency,  love,  an  awful  crisis !  which  hasn't  come  to 
you  yet,  and  may  not  come  at  all.  When  it  does,  so 
will  I !  in  that  name !  and  you  shall  call  me  by  it ! " 

"  Ah,  if  then  you  can  come !  But  what  do  we  know  ?  " 

"We  know  in  whom  we  trust,  Hilary;  must,  must, 
must  trust,  as  we  trust  and  must  trust  each  other." 

Still  hanging  to  his  hands  she  pushed  them  off  at 
arm's-length :  "Oh,  my  Hilary,  my  hero,  my  love,  my 
life,  my  commander,  go!"  And  yet  she  clung.  She 
drew  his  fingers  close  down  again  and  covered  them 
with  kisses,  while  twice,  thrice,  in  solemn  adoration, 
he  laid  his  lips  upon  her  heavy  hair.  Suddenly  the  two 
looked  up.  The  omnibuses  were  here  in  the  grove. 

Here  too  was  the  old  coachman,  with  the  soldier's 
horse.  The  vehicles  jogged  near  and  halted.  A  troop 
of  girls,  with  Flora,  tripped  out.  And  still,  in  their 
full  view,  with  Flora  closest,  the  bride's  hands  held  the 
bridegroom's  fast.  He  had  neither  the  strength  to  pull 
free  nor  the  wit  to  understand. 

"What  is  it?"  he  softly  asked,  as  the  staring  men 
waited  and  the  girls  about  Flora  hung  back. 

"Don't  you  know?"  murmured  Anna.  "Don't  you 
see — the — the  difference?" 

All  at  once  he  saw!  Throwing  away  her  hands  he 
caught  her  head  between  his  big  palms.  Her  arms 
flew  round  his  neck,  her  lips  went  to  his,  and  for  three 
heart-throbs  they  clung  like  bee  and  flower.  Then  he 
sprang  down  the  stair,  swung  into  the  saddle,  and  fled 
after  his  men. 


220 


"Victory!  I  Heard  it  as  PI'-" 

XLII 

"VICTORY!  i  HEARD  IT  AS  PL' — " 

THE  last  few  days  of  March  and  first  three  or  four  of 
April,  since  the  battery  boys  and  the  three  captains  had 
gone,  were  as  full  of  frightened  and  angry  questions  as 
the  air  is  of  bees  around  a  shaken  hive. 

So  Anna  had  foreboded,  yet  it  was  not  so  for  the 
causes  she  had  in  mind;  not  one  fierce  hum  asked 
another  where  the  bazaar's  money  was.  That  earlier 
bazaar,  in  the  St.  Louis  Hotel,  had  taken  six  weeks  to 
report  its  results,  and  now,  with  everybody  distracted 
by  a  swarm  and  buzz  of  far  larger,  livelier,  hotter 
queries,  the  bazaar's  sponsors  might  report  or  not,  as 
they  chose.  Meanwhile,  was  the  city  really  in  dire  and 
shameful  jeopardy,  or  was  it  as  safe  as  the  giddiest 
boasted?  Looking  farther  away,  over  across  Georgia 
to  Fort  Pulaski,  so  tremendously  walled  and  armed, 
was  the  "invader"  merely  wasting  lives,  trying  to  take 
it?  On  North  Carolina's  coast,  where  our  priceless 
blockade-runners  plied,  had  Newbern,  as  so  stubbornly 
rumored,  and  had  Beaufort,  already  fallen,  or  had 
they  really  not  ?  Had  the  Virginia  not  sunk  the  Moni 
tor  and  scattered  the  Northern  fleets?  Was  it  not  by 
France,  after  all  (asked  the  Creoles),  but  only  by  Para 
guay  that  the  Confederacy  had  been  "reco'nize"'? 
Was  there  no  truth  in  the  joyous  report  that  McClellan 
had  vanished  from  Yorktown  peninsula  ?  Was  the  loss 
of  Cumberland  Gap  a  trivial  matter,  and  did  it  in  fact 
not  cut  in  two  our  great  strategic  front  ?  Up  yonder  at 
Corinth,  our  "new  and  far  better"  base,  was  Sidney 

221 


Kincaid's  Battery 

Johnston  an  " imbecile,"  a  " coward,"  a  "traitor"?  or 
was  he  not  rather  an  unparagoned  strategist  who, 
having  at  last  "lured  the  presumptuous  foe"  into  his 
toils,  was  now,  with  Beauregard,  notwithstanding 
Beauregard's  protracted  illness,  about  to  make  the  "one 
fell  swoop"  of  our  complete  deliverance?  And  after 
the  swoop  and  its  joy  and  its  glory,  when  Johnnie  should 
come  marching  home,  whose  Johnnies,  and  how  many, 
would  never  return  ?  As  to  your  past-and-gone  bazaar, 
law,  honey ! 

So,  as  to  that  item,  in  all  the  wild-eyed  city  shaking 
with  its  ague  of  anxieties  only  Anna  was  troubled  when 
day  after  day  no  detective  came  back  with  the  old  mud- 
caked  dagger  and  now  both  were  away  on  some  quite 
alien  matter,  no  one  could  say  where.  She  alone  was 
troubled,  for  she  alone  knew  it  was  the  bazaar's  pro 
ceeds  which  had  disappeared.  Of  what  avail  to  tell 
even  Miranda,  Connie,  or  Flora  if  they  must  not  tell 
others?  It  would  only  bind  three  more  souls  on  the 
rack.  "Vanished  with  the  dagger!"  That  would  be 
all  they  could  gasp,  first  amazed,  then  scandalized,  at  a 
scheme  of  safe-keeping  so  fantastically  reckless;  reck 
less  and  fantastical  as  her  so-called  marriage.  Yes, 
they  would  be  as  scandalized  as  they  would  have  been 
charmed  had  the  scheme  prospered.  And  then  they 
would  blame  not  her  but  Hilary.  Blame  him  in  idle 
fear  of  a  calamity  that  was  not  going  to  befall ! 

She  might  have  told  that  sternest,  kindest,  wisest  of 
friends,  Doctor  Sevier.  As  the  family's  trustee  he 
might  yet  have  to  be  told.  But  on  that  night  of  fantas 
tical  recklessness  he  had  been  away,  himself  at  Corinth 
to  show  them  there  how  to  have  vastly  better  hospitals, 

222 


•'Victory!  I  Heard  it  as  PI'- 

and  to  prescribe  for  his  old  friend  Beauregard.  He 
had  got  back  but  yesterday.  Or  she  might  have  told 
the  gray  detective,  just  to  make  him  more  careful,  as 
Hilary,  by  letter,  suggested.  In  part  she  had  told  him, 
through  Flora ;  told  him  that  to  save  that  old  curio  she 
would  risk  her  life.  Surely,  knowing  that,  he  would  safe 
guard  it,  in  whatever  hands,  and  return  it  the  moment 
he  could.  Who  ever  heard  of  a  detective  not  returning 
a  thing  the  moment  he  could?  Not  Flora,  not  yet 
Madame,  they  said.  To  be  sure,  thought  Anna,  those 
professional  masters  of  delay,  the  photographers,  might 
be  more  jewel-wise  than  trustworthy,  but  what  photog 
rapher  could  ever  be  so  insane  as  to  rob  a  detective? 
So,  rather  ashamed  of  one  small  solicitude  in  this  day 
of  great  ones,  she  urged  her  committees  for  final  re 
ports — which  never  came — and  felt  very  wifely  in 
writing  her  hero  for  his  consent  to  things,  and  to  assure 
him  that  at  the  worst  her  own  part  of  the  family  estate 
would  make  everything  good,  the  only  harrowing  ques 
tion  being  how  to  keep  Miranda  and  Connie  from 
sharing  the  loss. 

On  the  first  Sunday  evening  in  April  Doctor  Sevier 
took  tea  with  the  Callenders,  self-invited,  alone  and 
firmly  oblivious  of  his  own  tardy  wedding-gift  to  Anna 
as  it  gleamed  at  him  on  the  board.  To  any  of  a  hun 
dred  hostesses  he  would  have  been  a  joy,  to  share  with 
as  many  friends  as  he  would  consent  to  meet;  for  in  the 
last  week  he  had  eaten  "  hog  and  hominy,"  and  sipped 
cornmeal  coffee,  in  lofty  colloquy  with  Sidney  Johnston 
and  his  "big  generals";  had  talked  confidentially  with 
Polk,  so  lately  his  own  bishop;  had  ridden  through  the 
miry  streets  of  Corinth  with  all  the  New  Orleans  com- 

223 


KincaicTs  Battery 

manders  of  division  or  brigade — Gibson,  Trudeau, 
Ruggles,  Brodnax;  out  on  the  parapets,  between  the 
guns,  had  chatted  with  Hilary  and  his  loved  lieutenants; 
down  among  the  tents  and  mess-fires  had  given  his 
pale  hand,  with  Spartan  injunctions  and  all  the  home 
news,  to  George  Gregory,  Ned  Ferry,  Dick  Smith,  and 
others  of  Harper's  cavalry,  and — circled  round  by 
Charlie  Valcour,  Sam  Gibbs,  Maxime,  and  scores  of 
their  comrades  in  Kincaid's  Battery — had  seen  once 
more  their  silken  flag,  so  faded !  and  touched  its  sacred 
stains  and  tatters.  Now  at  the  tea  table  something 
led  him  to  remark  that  here  at  home  the  stubborn 
illness  of  this  battery  sister  for  whom  Anna  was  acting 
as  treasurer  had  compelled  him  to  send  her  away. 

Timely  topic:  How  to  go  into  the  country,  and 
whither.  The  Callenders  were  as  eager  for  all  the 
facts  and  counsel  he  could  give  on  it  as  if  they  were  the 
"big  generals"  and  his  facts  and  counsel  were  as  to  the 
creeks,  swamps,  ridges,  tangled  ravines,  few  small  clear 
ings,  and  many  roads  and  by-roads  in  the  vast,  thinly 
settled,  small-farmed,  rain-drenched  forests  between 
Corinth  and  the  clay  bluffs  of  the  Tennessee.  For  now 
the  Callenders  also  were  to  leave  the  city,  as  soon  as 
they  could  be  ready. 

"Don't  wait  till  then,"  crisply  said  the  Doctor. 

"  We  must  wait  till  Nan  winds  up  the  bazaar." 

He  thought  not.    In  what  bank  had  she  its  money? 

When  she  said  not  in  any  he  frowned.  Whereupon 
she  smilingly  stammered  that  she  was  told  the  banks 
themselves  were  sending  their  treasure  into  the  country, 
and  that  even  ten  days  earlier,  when  some  one  wanted 
to  turn  a  fund  into  its  safest  portable  form,  three  banks 

224 


"Victory!  I  Heard  it  as  Pi'- 

had  declined  to  give  foreign  exchange  for  it  at  any 
price. 

"  Hmm ! "  he  mused.     "  Was  that  your,  eh, ?  " 

"My  husband,  yes,"  said  Anna,  so  quietly  that  the 
sister  and  stepmother  exulted  in  her.  As  quietly  her 
eyes  held  the  doctor's,  and  his  hers,  while  the  colour 
mounted  to  her  brow.  He  spoke: 

"Still  he  got  it  into  some  good  shape  for  you,  the 
fund,  did  he  not  ?  "  Then  suddenly  he  clapped  a  hand  to 
a  breast  pocket  and  stared :  "  He  gave  me  a  letter  for  you. 

Did  I ?  Ah,  yes,  I  have  your  written  thanks.  Anna, 

I  thoroughly  approve  what  you  and  he  have  done." 

Constance  and  Miranda  were  overjoyed.  He  turned 
to  them:  "I  told  Hilary  so  up  in  camp.  I  told  Steve. 
Yes,  Anna,  you  were  wise.  You  are  wise.  I've  no 
doubt  you're  doing  wisely  about  that  fund." 

It  was  hard  for  the  wise  one  not  to  look  guilty. 

"Have  you  told  anybody,"  he  continued,  "in  what 
form  you  have  it,  or  where?" 

"No!"  put  in  the  aggrieved  Constance,  "not  even 
her  blood  kin!" 

"  Wise  again.  Best  for  all  of  you.  Now  just  hang  to 
the  lucre.  It  comes  too  late  to  be  of  use  here;  this 
brave  town  will  have  to  stand  or  fall  without  it.  But 
it's  still  good  for  Mobile,  and  Mobile  saved  may  be 
New  Orleans  recovered. 

On  a  hint  from  the  other  women,  and  urged  by  their 
visitor,  Anna  brought  the  letter  and  read  him  several 
closely  written  pages  on  the  strategic  meaning  of  things. 
The  zest  with  which  he  discussed  the  lines  made  her 
newly  proud  of  their  source. 

"They're  so  like  his  very  word  oj  mouth,"  said  he, 
225 


Kincaid's  Battery 

"they  bring  him  right  back  here  among  us.  Yes,  and 
the  whole  theatre  of  action  with  him.  They  draw  it 
about  us  so  closely  and  relate  it  all  to  us  so  vitally  that 
it " 

"Seems,"  broke  in  the  delighted  Constance,  "as  if 
we  saw  it  all  from  the  top  of  this  house!" 

The  Doctor's  jaw  set.  Who  likes  phrases  stuffed 
into  his  mouth?  Yet  presently  he  allowed  himself  to 
resume.  It  confirmed,  he  said,  Beauregard's  word  in 
his  call  for  volunteers,  that  there,  before  Corinth,  was 
the  place  to  defend  Louisiana.  Soon  he  had  regained 
his  hueless  ardor,  and  laid  out  the  whole  matter  on  the 
table  for  the  inspiration  of  his  three  confiding  auditors. 
Here  at  Chattanooga,  so  impregnably  ours,  issued 
Tennessee  river  and  the  Memphis  and  Charleston  rail 
road  from  the  mountain  gateway  between  our  eastern 
and  western  seats  of  war.  Here  they  swept  down  into 
Alabama,  passed  from  the  state's  north-east  to  its  north 
west  corner  and  parted  company.  Here  the  railway 
continued  westward,  here  it  crossed  the  Mobile  and 
Ohio  railroad  at  Corinth,  here  the  Mississippi  Central 
at  Grand  Junction,  and  pressed  on  to  Memphis,  our 
back-gate  key  of  the  Mississippi. 

"In  war,"  said  the  Doctor,  "rivers  and  railro' " 

"Are  the  veins  and  arteries  of — oh,  pardon!"  The 
crime  was  Anna's  this  time. 

"Are  the  lines  fought  for,"  resumed  the  speaker, 
"and  wherever  two  or  three  of  them  join  or  cross  you 
may  look  for  a  battle."  His  long  finger  dropped  again 
to  the  table.  Back  here  in  Alabama  the  Tennessee 
turned  north  to  seek  the  Ohio,  and  here,  just  over  the 
Mississippi  state  line,  in  Tennessee,  some  twenty  miles 

226 


•'Victory!  I  Heard  it  as  Pi'- 

north  of  Corinth,  it  became  navigable  for  the  Ohio's 
steamboats — gunboats — transports — at  a  place  called 
in  the  letter  "  Pittsburg  Landing." 

Yes,  now,  between  Hilary's  pages  and  the  Doctor's 
logic,  with  Hilary  almost  as  actually  present  as  the 
physician,  the  ladies  saw  why  this  great  Memphis- 
Chattanooga  fighting  line  was,  not  alone  pictorially,  but 
practically,  right  at  hand !  barely  beyond  sight  and  hear 
ing  or  the  feel  of  its  tremor;  a  veritable  back  garden 
wall  to  them  and  their  beloved  city;  as  close  as  forts 
Jackson  and  St.  Philip,  her  front  gate.  Yes,  and — 
Anna  ventured  to  point  out  and  the  Doctor  grudgingly 
admitted — if  the  brave  gray  hosts  along  that  back  wall 
should  ever — could  ever — be  borne  back  so  far  south 
ward,  westward,  the  last  line  would  have  to  run  from 
one  to  another  of  the  Crescent  City's  back  doorsteps 
and  doors;  from  Vicksburg,  that  is,  eastward  through 
Jackson,  Mississippi's  capital,  cross  the  state's  two 
north-and-south  railways,  and  swing  down  through 
Alabama  to  Mobile  on  the  Gulf.  This,  she  silently 
perceived,  was  why  the  letter  and  the  Doctor  quite 
agreed  that  Connie,  Miranda,  and  she  ought  to  find  their 
haven  somewhere  within  the  dim  region  between  New 
Orleans  and  those  three  small  satellite  cities;  not  near 
any  two  railways,  yet  close  enough  to  a  single  one  for 
them  to  get  news,  public  or  personal,  in  time  to  act  on  it. 

At  leave-taking  came  the  guest's  general  summing 
up  of  fears  and  faiths.  All  his  hope  for  New  Orleans, 
he  said,  was  in  the  forts  down  at  the  Passes.  Should 
they  fall  the  city  could  not  stand.  But  amid  their 
illimitable  sea  marshes  and  their  impenetrable  swamp 
forests,  chin-deep  in  the  floods  of  broken  levees,  he 

227 


Kincaid's  Battery 

truly  believed,  they  would  hold  out.  Let  them  do  so 
only  till  the  first  hot  breath  of  real  Delta  summer  should 
bring  typhoid,  breakbone,  yellow,  and  swamp  fevers, 
the  last  by  all  odds  the  worst,  and  Butler's  unacclimated 
troops  would  have  to  reembark  for  home  pell-mell  or 
die  on  Ship  Island  like  poisoned  fish.  So  much  for  the 
front  gate.  For  the  back  gate,  Corinth,  which  just 
now  seemed  —  the  speaker  harkened. 

"Seemed,"  he  resumed,  "so  much  more  like  the 
front  —  listen  !  "  There  came  a  far,  childish  call. 

"An  extra,"  laughed  Constance.  "Steve  says  we 
issue  one  every  time  he  brushes  his  uniform." 

"But,  Con,"  argued  Anna,  "an  extra  on  Sunday 
evening,  brought  away  down  here  -  "  The  call 
piped  nearer. 

"Victory!"    echoed    Constance.     "I    heard    it    as 


"Beauregard!  Tennessee!"  exclaimed  both  sisters. 
They  flew  to  the  veranda,  the  other  two  following. 
Down  in  the  gate  could  be  seen  the  old  coachman, 
already  waiting  to  buy  the  paper.  Constance  called  to 
him  their  warm  approval.  "I  thought,"  murmured 
Miranda,  "that  Beauregard  was  in  Miss'  -  " 

Anna  touched  her,  and  the  cry  came  again:  "Great 
victory  -  !"  Yes,  yes,  but  by  whom,  and  where? 
Johnston?  Corinth?  "Great  victory  at  --  !" 
Where?  Where,  did  he  say?  The  word  came  again, 
and  now  again,  but  still  it  was  tauntingly  vague. 
Anna's  ear  seemed  best,  yet  even  she  could  say  only, 
"I  never  heard  of  such  a  place  —  out  of  the  bible. 
It  sounds  like—  Shiloh." 

Shiloh  it  was.  At  a  table  lamp  indoors  the  Doctor 
228 


Sabbath  at  Shiloh 

bent  over  the  fresh  print.  "It's  true,"  he  affirmed. 
"It's  Beauregard's  own  despatch.  'A  complete  vic 
tory,'  he  says.  '  Driving  the  enemy' "  The  reader 

ceased  and  stared  at  the  page.  "Why,  good  God!" 
Slowly  he  lifted  his  eyes  upon  those  three  sweet  women 
until  theirs  ran  full.  And  then  he  stared  once  more 
into  the  page:  "Oh,  good  God!  Albert  Sidney  Johns 
ton  is  dead." 

XLIII 

SABBATH    AT    SHILOH 

"WHOLE  theatre  of  action." 

The  figure  had  sounded  apt  to  Anna  on  that  Sunday 
evening  when  the  Doctor  employed  it;  apt  enough — 
until  the  outburst  of  that  great  and  dreadful  news 
whose  inseparable  implications  and  forebodings  robbed 
her  of  all  sleep  that  night  and  made  her  the  first  one 
astir  at  daybreak.  But  thenceforward,  and  now  for 
half  a  week  or  more,  the  aptness  seemed  quite  to  have 
passed.  Strange  was  the  theatre  whose  play  was  all  and 
only  a  frightful  reality;  whose  swarming,  thundering, 
smoking  stage  had  its  audience,  its  New  Orleans  audi 
ence,  wholly  behind  it,  and  whose  curtain  of  distance, 
however  thin,  mocked  every  bodily  sense  and  compelled 
all  to  be  seen  and  heard  by  the  soul's  eye  and  ear,  with 
all  the  joy  and  woe  of  its  actuality  and  all  its  suspense, 
terror,  triumph,  heartbreak,  and  despair. 

Yet  here  was  that  theatre,  and  the  Doctor's  metaphor 
was  still  good  enough  for  the  unexacting  taste  of  the 
two  Valcour  ladies,  to  whom  Anna  had  quoted  it. 
And  here,  sprinkled  through  the  vast  audience  of  that 

229 


Kincaid's  Battery 

theatre,  with  as  keen  a  greed  for  its  play  as  any,  were  all 
the  various  non-combatants  with  whom  we  are  here 
concerned,  though  not  easily  to  be  singled  out,  such 
mere  units  were  they  of  the  impassioned  multitude 
every  mere  unit  of  which,  to  loved  and  loving  ones, 
counted  for  more  than  we  can  tell. 

However,  our  favourites  might  be  glimpsed  now  and 
then.  On  a  certain  mid-day  of  that  awful  half-week 
the  Callenders,  driving,  took  up  Victorine  at  her  gate 
and  Flora  at  her  door  and  sped  up-town  to  the  news 
paper  offices  in  Camp  street  to  rein  in  against  a  count 
less  surge  of  old  men  in  fine  dress,  their  precious  dig 
nity  thrown  to  the  dogs,  each  now  but  one  of  the  com 
mon  herd,  and  each  against  all,  shouldering,  sweating, 
and  brandishing  wide  hands  to  be  the  first  purchaser 
and  reader  of  the  list,  the  long,  ever-lengthening  list  of 
the  killed  and  wounded.  Much  had  been  learned  of 
the  great  two-days'  battle,  and  many  an  infantry  sister, 
and  many  a  battery  sister  besides  Anna,  was  second- 
sighted  enough  to  see,  night  and  day,  night  and  day, 
the  muddy  labyrinth  of  roads  and  by-roads  that  braided 
and  traversed  the  wide,  unbroken  reaches  of  dense 
timber — with  their  deep  ravines,  their  long  ridges,  and 
their  creek-bottom  marshes  and  sloughs — in  the  day's 
journey  from  Corinth  to  the  bluffs  of  the  Tennessee. 
They  saw  them,  not  empty,  nor  fearlessly  crossed  by  the 
quail,  the  wild  turkey,  the  fox,  or  the  unhunted  deer, 
nor  travelled  alone  by  the  homespun  "citizen"  or  by 
scouts  or  foragers,  but  slowly  overflowed  by  a  great 
gray,  silent,  tangled,  armed  host — cavalry,  infantry, 
ordnance  trains,  batteries,  battery  wagons  and  ambu- 
ances:  Saw  Hilary  Kincaid  and  all  his  heroes  and 

230 


Sabbath  at  Shiloh 

their  guns,  and  all  the  "  big  generals "  and  their  smart 
escorts  and  busy  staffs:  Saw  the  various  columns  im 
peding  each  other,  taking  wrong  ways  and  losing  price 
less  hours  while  thousands  of  inexperienced  boys, 
footsore,  drenched  and  shivering  yet  keen  for  the  fight, 
ate  their  five-days'  food  in  one,  or  threw  it  away  to 
lighten  the  march,  and  toiled  on  in  hunger,  mud,  cold 
and  rain,  without  the  note  of  a  horn  or  drum  or  the  dis 
tant  eye  of  one  blue  scout  to  tell  of  their  oncoming. 

They  saw,  did  Anna  and  those  sisters  (and  many  and 
many  a  wife  and  mother  from  Callender  House  to  Car- 
rollton),  the  vast,  stealthy,  fireless  bivouac  at  fall  of 
night,  in  ear-shot  of  the  enemy's  tattoo,  unsheltered  from 
the  midnight  storm  save  by  raked-up  leaves :  Saw,  just  in 
the  bivouac's  tortuous  front,  softly  reddening  the  low 
wet  sky,  that  huge,  rude  semicircle  of  camps  in  the 
dark  ridged  and  gullied  forests  about  Shiloh' s  log  meet 
ing-house,  where  the  victorious  Grant's  ten-thousands — 
from  Ohio,  Kentucky,  Indiana,  Illinois,  Missouri,  Iowa, 
Wisconsin,  Michigan,  as  new  to  arms  as  their  foe,  yet 
a  band  of  lions  in  lair — lay  dry- tented,  full  fed  and  fast 
asleep,  safely  flanked  by  swollen  streams,  their  gun 
boats  behind  them  and  Buell  coming,  but  without  one 
mounted  outpost,  a  scratch  of  entrenchment  or  a  whis 
per  ot  warning. 

Amid  the  eager  carriage  talk,  in  which  Anna  kept  her 
part,  her  mind's  eye  still  saw  the  farther  scene  as  it 
changed  again  and  the  gray  dawn  and  gray  host  fur 
tively  rose  together  and  together  silently  spread  through 
the  deep  woods.  She  watched  the  day  increase  and 
noon  soar  up  and  sink  away  while  the  legions  of  Hardee, 
Bragg,  Polk  and  Breckinridge  slowly  writhed  out  of 

231 


KincaicTs  Battery 

their  perplexed  folds  and  set  themselves,  still  unde 
tected,  in  their  three  successive  lines  of  battle.  She  be 
held  the  sun  set  calm  and  clear,  the  two  hosts  lie  down 
once  more,  one  in  its  tents,  the  other  on  its  arms,  the 
leafy  night  hang  over  them  resplendent  with  stars,  its 
watches  near  by,  the  Southern  lines  reawaken  in  re 
covered  strength,  spring  up  and  press  forward  exult 
antly  to  the  awful  issue,  and  the  Sabbath  dawn  brighten 
into  a  faultless  day  with  the  boom  of  the  opening  gun. 

As  the  ladies  drew  up  behind  the  throng  and  across 
the  throat  of  Commercial  Alley  the  dire  List  began  to 
flutter  from  the  Picayune  office  in  greedy  palms  and 
over  and  among  dishevelled  heads  like  a  feeding  swarm 
of  white  pigeons.  News  there  was  as  well  as  names, 
but  every  eye  devoured  the  names  first  and  then — un 
less  some  name  struck  lightning  in  the  heart,  as  Anna 
saw  it  do  every  here  and  there  and  for  that  poor  old 
man  over  yonder — after  the  names  the  news. 

"Nan,  we  needn't  stay  if  you " 

"Oh,  Miranda,  isn't  all  this  ours?" 

The  bulletin  boards  were  already  telling  in  outline, 
ahead  of  the  list,  thrilling  things  about  the  Orleans 
Guards,  the  whirlwind  onset  of  whose  maiden  bayonets 
had  captured  double  its  share  of  the  first  camp  taken 
from  the  amazed,  unbreakfasted  enemy,  and  who  again 
and  again,  hour  by  hour,  by  the  half-mile  and  mile,  had 
splendidly  helped  to  drive  him — while  he  hammered 
back  with  a  deadly  stubbornness  all  but  a  match  for  their 
fury.  Through  forests,  across  clearings,  over  streams 
and  bogs  and  into  and  out  of  ravines  and  thickets  they 
had  swept,  seizing  transiently  a  whole  field  battery, 
permanently  hundreds  of  prisoners,  and  covering  the 

232 


Sabbath  at  Shiloh 

strife's  broad  wake  with  even  more  appalling  numbers 
of  their  own  dead  and  wounded  than  of  the  foe's: 
wailing  wounded,  ghastly,  grimy  dead,  who  but  yester 
day  were  brothers,  cousins  and  playmates  of  these  very 
men  snatching  and  searching  the  list.  They  told,  those 
boards,  of  the  Washington  Artillery  (fifth  company, 
never  before  under  fire)  being  thanked  on  the  field  by 
one  of  the  "  big  generals,"  their  chests  and  wheels  shot 
half  to  splinters  but  no  gun  lost.  They  told  of  all 
those  Louisiana  commands  whose  indomitable  lines 
charged  and  melted,  charged  and  withered,  over  and 
over  the  torn  and  bloody  ground  in  that  long,  horrible 
struggle  that  finally  smoked  out  the  "Hornets'  Nest." 
They  told  of  the  Crescent  Regiment,  known  and  loved 
on  all  these  sidewalks  and  away  up  to  and  beyond  their 
Bishop- General  Folk's  Trinity  Church,  whose  desperate 
gallantry  had  saved  that  same  Washington  Artillery 
three  of  its  pieces,  and  to  whose  thinned  and  bleeding 
ranks  swarms  of  the  huddled  Western  farm  boys,  as 
shattered  and  gory  as  their  captors  and  as  glorious,  had 
at  last  laid  down  their  arms.  And  they  told  of  Kincaid's 
Battery,  Captain  Kincaid  commanding;  how,  having 
early  lost  in  the  dense  oak  woods  and  hickory  brush  the 
brigade — Brodnax's — whose  way  they  had  shelled  open 
for  a  victorious  charge,  they  had  followed  their  galloping 
leader,  the  boys  running  beside  the  wheels,  from  posi 
tion  to  position,  from  ridge  to  ridge,  in  rampant  obedi 
ence  of  an  order  to  "go  in  wherever  they  heard  the  hot 
test  firing  " ,  how  for  a  time  they  had  fought  hub  to  hub 
beside  the  Washington  Artillery;  how  two  of  their  guns, 
detached  for  a  special  hazard  and  sweeping  into  fresh 
action  on  a  flank  of  the  "Hornets'  Nest,"  had  lost 

233 


Kincaid's  Battery 

every  horse  at  a  single  volley  of  the  ambushed  foe,  yet 
had  instantly  replied  with  slaughterous  vengeance;  and 
how,  for  an  hour  thereafter,  so  wrapped  in  their  own 
smoke  that  they  could  be  pointed  only  by  the  wheel-ruts 
of  their  recoil,  they  had  been  worked  by  their  depleted 
gunners  on  hands  and  knees  with  Kincaid  and  Vil- 
leneuve  themselves  at  the  trails  and  with  fuses  cut  to 
one  second.  So,  in  scant  outline  said  the  boards,  or 
more  in  detail  read  one  man  aloud  to  another  as  they 
hurried  by  the  carriage. 

"But,"  said  Anna,  while  Flora  enjoyed  her  pallor, 
"all  that  is  about  the  first  day's  fight!" 

"No,"  cried  Constance,  "it's  the  second  day's,  that 
Beauregard  calls  'a  great  and  glorious  victory!'" 

"Yes,"  interposed  Flora,  "'but  writing  from  behind 
his  fortification'  at  Corinth,  yesf" 


XLIV 

"THEY  WERE  ALL  FOUR  TOGETHER" 

BOTH  Constance  and  Victorine  flashed  to  retort,  but 
saw  the  smiling  critic  as  pale  as  Anna  and  recalled  the 
moment's  truer  business,  the  list  still  darting  innumer 
ably  around  them  always  out  of  reach.  The  carriage 
had  to  push  into  the  very  surge,  and  Victorine  to  stand 
up  and  call  down  to  this  man  and  that,  a  fourth  and 
fifth,  before  one  could  be  made  to  hear  and  asked  to 
buy  for  the  helpless  ladies.  Yet  in  this  gentlewomen's 
war  every  gentlewoman's  wish  was  a  military  command, 
and  when  at  length  one  man  did  hear,  to  hear  was  to 
vanish  in  the  turmoil  on  their  errand.  Now  he  was 

234 


"They  Were  all  Four  Together " 

back  again,  with  the  list,  three  copies !  Oh,  thank  you, 
thank  you  and  thank  you! 

Away  trotted  the  handsome  span  while  five  pairs  of 
beautiful  eyes  searched  the  three  printed  sheets,  that  bore 
— oh,  marvellous  fortune! — not  one  of  the  four  names 
writ  largest  in  those  five  hearts.  Let  joy  be — ah,  let  joy 
be  very  meek  while  to  so  many  there  is  unutterable  loss. 
Yet  let  it  meekly  abound  for  the  great  loved  cause  so 
splendidly  advanced.  Miranda  pointed  Anna  to  a  bit 
of  editorial: 

"Monday  was  a  more  glorious  day  than  Sunday. 
We  can  scarcely  forbear  to  speculate  upon  the  great  re 
sults  that  are  to  flow  from  this  decisive  victory.  An  in 
stant  pursuit  of  the  flying  enemy  should " 

Why  did  the  carriage  halt  at  a  Gravier  Street  crossing 
obliquely  opposite  the  upper  front  corner  of  the  St. 
Charles  Hotel?  Why  did  all  the  hotel's  gold-braided 
guests  and  loungers  so  quietly  press  out  against  its  upper 
balustrades  ?  Why,  under  its  arches,  and  between  bal 
cony  posts  along  the  curbstones  clear  down  to  Canal 
Street,  was  the  pathetically  idle  crowd  lining  up  so  si 
lently  ?  From  that  point  why,  now,  did  the  faint  breeze 
begin  to  waft  a  low  roar  of  drums  of  such  grave  un- 
martial  sort?  And  why,  gradually  up  the  sidewalks' 
edges  in  the  hot  sun,  did  every  one  so  solemnly  un 
cover  ?  Small  Victorine  stood  up  to  see. 

At  first  she  made  out  only  that  most  commonplace 
spectacle,  home  guards.  They  came  marching  in  pla 
toons,  a  mere  company  or  two.  In  the  red  and  blue  of 
their  dress  was  ail  the  smartness  yet  of  last  year,  but  in 
their  tread  was  none  of  it  and  even  the  bristle  of  their 
steel  had  vanished.  Behind  majestic  brasses  and  muf- 

235 


KincaicTs  Battery 

fled  drums  grieving  out  the  funeral  march,  they  stepped 
with  slow  precision  and  with  arms  reversed.  But  now 
in  abrupt  contrast  there  appeared,  moving  as  slowly 
and  precisely  after  them,  widely  apart  on  either  side  of 
the  stony  way,  two  single  attenuated  files  of  but  four 
bronzed  and  shabby  gray-jackets  each,  with  four  others 
in  one  thin,  open  rank  from  file  to  file  in  their  rear,  and 
in  the  midst  a  hearse  and  its  palled  burden.  Rise, 
Anna,  Constance,  Miranda — all.  Ah,  Albert  Sidney 
Johnston!  Weep,  daughters  of  a  lion-hearted  cause. 
The  eyes  of  its  sons  are  wet.  Yet  in  your  gentle  bosoms 
keep  great  joy  for  whoever  of  your  very  own  and 
nearest  the  awful  carnage  has  spared;  but  hither  comes, 
here  passes  slowly,  and  yonder  fades  at  length  from 
view,  to  lie  a  day  in  state  and  so  move  on  to  burial,  a 
larger  hope  of  final  triumph  than  ever  again  you  may 
fix  on  one  mortal  man. 

Hats  on  again,  softly.  Drift  apart,  aimless  crowd. 
Cross  the  two  streets  at  once,  diagonally,  you,  young  man 
from  the  St.  Charles  Hotel  with  purpose  in  your  rapid 
step,  pencil  unconsciously  in  hand  and  trouble  on  your 
brow.  Regather  your  reins,  old  coachman — nay,  one 
moment!  The  heavy-hearted  youth  passed  so  close 
under  the  horses'  front  that  only  after  he  had  gained 
the  banquette  abreast  the  carriage  did  he  notice  its  oc 
cupants  and  Anna's  eager  bow.  It  was  the  one-armed 
Kincaid's  Battery  boy  reporter.  With  a  sudden  pitying 
gloom  he  returned  the  greeting,  faltered  as  if  to  speak, 
caught  a  breath  and  then  hurried  on  and  away.  What 
did  that  mean;  more  news:  news  bad  for  these  five  in 
particular?  Silently  in  each  of  them,  without  a  glance 
from  one  to  another,  the  question  asked  itself. 

236 


''They  Were  all  Four  Together' 

"The  True  Delta,"  remarked  Anna  to  Miranda,  "is 
right  down  here  on  the  next  square,"  and  of  his  own 
motion  the  driver  turned  that  way. 

"  Bitwin  Common  Strit  and  Can-al,"  added  Victorine, 
needless  words  being  just  then  the  most  needed. 

Midway  in  front  of  the  hotel  Anna  softly  laid  a  hand 
on  Flora,  who  respondingly  murmured.  For  the  re 
porter  was  back,  moving  their  way  along  the  sidewalk 
almost  at  a  run.  Now  Constance  was  aware  of  him. 

"When  we  cross  Common  Street,"  she  observed  to 
Miranda,  "he'll  want  to  stop  us." 

In  fact,  as  soon  as  their  intent  to  cross  was  plain,  he 
sped  out  beside  them  and  stood,  his  empty  sleeve  pin 
ned  up,  his  full  one  raised  and  grief  evident  in  his 
courteous  smile.  Some  fifty  yards  ahead,  by  the  True 
Delta  office,  men  were  huddling  around  a  fresh  bulletin. 
Baring  his  brow  to  the  sun,  the  young  man  came  close 
to  the  wheels. 

"Wouldn't  you-all  as  soon — ?"  he  began,  but  Con 
stance  interrupted : 

"  The  news  is  as  good  as  ever,  isn't  it  ?  " 

"Yes,  but  wouldn't  you-all  as  soon  drive  round  by 
Carondelet  Street?"  A  gesture  with  his  hat  showed  a 
piece  of  manifold  writing  in  his  fingers. 

He  looked  to  Miranda,  but  she  faltered.  Flora,  in 
her  own  way,  felt  all  the  moment's  rack  and  stress,  but 
some  natures  are  built  for  floods  and  rise  on  them  like 
a  boat.  So  thought  she  of  herself  and  had  parted  her 
lips  to  speak  for  all,  when,  to  her  vexed  surprise,  Anna 
lifted  a  hand  and  in  a  clear,  firm  tone  inquired,  "Is 
there  any  bad  news  for  us  five?"  The  youth's  tongue 
failed;  he  nodded. 

237 


KincaicTs  Battery 

"  Brodnax's  brigade  ?  "  she  asked.    "  Our  battery  ?  " 

"Yes,  Monday,  just  at  the  last,"  he  murmured. 

"Not  token?" 

"Not  a  gun!"  replied  the  boy,  with  a  flash.  Anna 
reflected  it,  but  her  tone  did  not  change : 

"There  are  four  men,  you  know,  whom  we  five " 

"Yes." 

"Which  of  them  is  the  bad  news  about?" 

"All  four,"  murmured  the  youth.  His  eyes  swam. 
His  hat  went  under  the  stump  of  his  lost  arm  and  he 
proffered  the  bit  of  writing.  Idlers  were  staring.  "Take 
that  with  you,"  he  said.  "They  were  all  four  to 
gether  and  they're  only " 

The  carriage  was  turning,  but  the  fair  cluster  bent 
keenly  toward  him.  "Only  what?"  they  cried. 

"Missing." 

XLV 

STEVE — MAXIME — CHARLIE — 

THERE  was  no  real  choice.  Nothing  seemed  quite 
rational  but  the  heaviest  task  of  all — to  wait,  and  to 
wait  right  here  at  home. 

To  this  queenly  city  must  come  first  and  fullest  all 
news  of  her  own  sons,  and  here  the  "five"  would  not 
themselves  be  "missing"  should  better  tidings — or 
worse — come  seeking  them  over  the  wires. 

"At  the  front?"  replied  Doctor  Sevier  to  Anna, 
"why,  at  the  front  you'll  be  kept  in  the  rear,  lost  in 
a  storm  of  false  rumors." 

General  Brodnax,  in  a  letter  rife  with  fatherly 
romantic  tenderness  and  with  splendid  praise  of  Hilary 

238 


Steve— Maxime — Charlie— 

as  foremost  in  the  glorious  feat  which  had  saved  old 
" Roaring  Betsy"  but  lost  (or  mislaid)  him  and  his 
three  comrades,  also  bade  her  wait.  Everything,  he 
assured  her,  that  human  sympathy  or  the  art  of  war 
— or  Beauregard's  special  orders — could  effect  was 
being  done  to  find  the  priceless  heroes.  In  the  retreat 
of  a  great  host — ah,  me!  retreat  was  his  very  word 
and  the  host  was  Dixie's — retreating  after  its  first 
battle,  and  that  an  awful  one,  in  deluging  rains  over 
frightful  roads  and  brimming  streams,  unsheltered, 
ill  fed,  with  sick  and  wounded  men  and  reeling  vehicles 
hourly  breaking  down,  a  hovering  foe  to  be  fended  off, 
and  every  dwelling  in  the  land  a  hospitable  refuge, 
even  captains  of  artillery  or  staff  might  be  most  honor 
ably  and  alarmingly  missing  yet  reappear  safe  and 
sound.  So,  for  a  week  and  more  it  was  sit  and  wait, 
pace  the  floor  and  wait,  wake  in  the  night  and  wait; 
so  for  Flora  as  well  as  for  Anna  (with  a  difference), 
both  of  them  anxious  for  Charlie — and  Steve — and 
Maxime,  but  in  anguish  for  another. 

Then  tidings,  sure  enough!  glad  tidings!  Mande- 
ville  and  Maxime  safe  in  camp  again  and  back  to  duty, 
whole,  hale  and  in  the  saddle.  Their  letters  came  by 
the  wasted  yellow  hands  of  two  or  three  of  the  home 
coming  wounded,  scores  of  whom  were  arriving  by 
every  south-bound  train.  From  the  aide-de-camp 
and  the  color-bearer  came  the  first  whole  story  of  how 
Kincaid,  with  his  picked  volunteers,  barely  a  gun  de 
tachment,  and  with  Mandeville,  who  had  brought  the 
General's  consent,  had  stolen  noiselessly  over  the 
water-soaked  leaves  of  a  thickety  oak  wood  in  the 
earliest  glimmer  of  a  rainy  dawn  and  drawn  off  the 

239 


KincaicTs  Battery 

abandoned  gun  by  hand  to  its  waiting  horses;  also  how, 
when  threatened  by  a  hostile  patrol,  Hilary,  Mande- 
ville,  Maxime  and  Charlie  had  hurried  back  on  foot 
into  the  wood  and  hotly  checked  the  pursuit  long  enough 
for  their  fellows  to  mount  the  team,  lay  a  shoulder  to 
every  miry  wheel  and  flounder  away  with  the  prize. 
But  beyond  that  keen  moment  when  the  four,  after 
their  one  volley  from  ambush,  had  sprung  this  way 
and  that  shouting  absurd  orders  to  make-believe  men, 
cheering  and  firing  from  behind  trees,  and  (cut  off 
from  their  horses)  had  made  for  a  gully  and  swamp, 
the  two  returned  ones  could  tell  nothing  of  the  two 
unreturned  except  that  neither  of  them,  dead  or  alive, 
was  anywhere  on  the  ground  of  the  fight  or  flight  as 
they  knew  it.  For  days,  inside  the  enemy's  advancing 
lines,  they  had  prowled  in  ravines  and  lain  in  black 
berry  patches  and  sassafras  fence-rows,  fed  and  helped 
on  of  nights  by  the  beggared  yet  still  warm-hearted 
farm  people  and  getting  through  at  last,  but  with 
never  a  trace  of  Kincaid  or  Charlie,  though  after  their 
own  perilous  search  they  had  inquired,  inquired,  in 
quired. 

So,  wait,  said  every  one  and  every  dumb  condition, 
even  the  miseries  of  the  great  gray  army,  of  which 
Anna  had  mind  pictures  again,  as  it  toiled  through 
mire  and  lightning,  rain,  sleet  and  hail,  and  as  its 
thousands  of  sick  and  shattered  lay  in  Corinth  dying 
fifty  a  day.  And  Flora  and  Anna  waited,  though  with 
minds  placid  only  to  each  other  and  the  outer  world. 

"Yes,"  moaned  Anna  to  Constance,  when  found  at 
dead  of  night  staring  Corinthward  from  a  chamber 
window.  "Yes,  friends  advise!  All  our  friends  ad- 

240 


Steve— Maxime— Charlie- 
vise!  What  daring  thing  did  any  one  ever  do  who 
waited  for  friends  to  advise  it?  Does  your  Steve  wait 
for  friends  to  advise?  .  .  .  Patience?  Ah,  lend  me 
yours!  You  don't  need  it  now.  .  .  .  Fortitude?  Oh, 
I  never  had  any !  .  .  .  What  ?  command  the  courage  to 
do  nothing  when  nothing  is  the  only  hard  thing  to  do  ? 
Who,  I?  Connie!  I  don't  even  want  it.  I'm  a  craven; 
I  want  the  easy  thing!  I  want  to  go  nurse  the  box- 
carloads  and  mule-wagonloads  of  wounded  at  Corinth, 
at  Okolona  and  strewed  all  the  way  down  to  Mobile — 
that's  full  of  them.  Hilary  may  be  somewhere  among 
them — unidentified!  They  say  he  wore  no  badge 
of  rank  that  morning,  you  know,  and  carried  the  car 
bine  of  a  wounded  cavalryman  to  whom  he  had  given 
his  coat.  Oh,  he's  mine,  Con,  and  I'm  his.  We're 
not  engaged,  we're  married,  and  I  must  .go.  It's  only 
a  step — except  in  miles — and  I'm  going!  I'm  going 
for  your  sake  and  Miranda's.  You  know  you're  stay 
ing  on  my  account,  not  for  me  to  settle  this  bazaar  busi 
ness  but  to  wait  for  news  that's  never  coming  till  I 
go  and  bring  it!" 

This  tiny,  puny,  paltry  business  of  the  bazaar — 
the  whereabouts  of  the  dagger  and  its  wealth,  or  of 
the  detectives,  gone  for  good  into  military  secret  ser 
vice  at  the  front — she  drearily  smiled  away  the  whole 
trivial  riddle  as  she  lay  of  nights  contriving  new  searches 
for  that  inestimable,  living  treasure,  whose  perpetual 
"missing,"  right  yonder  "almost  in  sight  from  the 
housetop,"  was  a  dagger  in  her  heart. 

And  the  Valcours  ?  Yes,  they,  too,  had  their  frantic 
impulses  to  rise  and  fly.  For  Madame,  though  her 
lean  bosom  bled  for  the  lost  boy,  the  fiercest  pain  of 

241 


Kincaid's  Battery 

waiting  was  that  its  iron  coercion  lay  in  their  penury. 
For  Flora  its  sharpest  pangs  were  in  her  own  rage; 
a  rage  not  of  the  earlier,  cold  sort  against  Anna  and 
whoever  belonged  to  Anna — that  transport  had  al 
ways  been  more  than  half  a  joy — but  a  new,  hot  rage 
against  herself  and  the  finical  cheapness  of  her  scheming, 
a  rage  that  stabbed  her  fair  complacency  with  the 
revelation  that  she  had  a  heart,  and  a  heart  that  could 
ache  after  another.  The  knife  of  that  rage  turned 
in  her  breast  every  time  she  cried  to  the  grandam, 
"We  must  go!"  and  that  rapacious  torment  simpered, 
"No  funds,"  adding  sidewise  hints  toward  Anna's 
jewels,  still  diligently  manoeuvred  for,  but  still  some 
where  up-stairs  in  Callender  House,  sure  to  go  with 
Anna  should  Anna  go  while  the  manceuvrers  were 
away. 

A  long  lane  to  any  one,  was  such  waiting,  lighted, 
for  Anna,  only  by  a  faint  reflection  of  that  luster  of 
big  generals'  strategy  and  that  invincibility  of  the 
Southern  heart  which,  to  all  New  Orleans  and  even  to 
nations  beyond  seas,  clad  Dixie's  every  gain  in  light 
and  hid  her  gravest  disasters  in  beguiling  shadow. 
But  suddenly  one  day  the  long  lane  turned.  The 
secret  had  just  leaked  out  that  the  forts  down  the  river 
were  furiously  engaged  with  the  enemy's  mortar-boats 
a  few  miles  below  them  and  that  in  the  past  forty- 
eight  hours  one  huge  bomb  every  minute,  three  thous 
and  in  all,  had  dropped  into  those  forts  or  burst  over 
them,  yet  the  forts  were  "proving  themselves  impreg 
nable."  The  lane  turned  and  there  stood  Charlie. 

There  he  stood,  in  the  stairway  door  of  the  front 
room  overlooking  Jackson  Square.  The  grandmother 

242 


Steve— Maxime— Charlie— 

and  sister  had  been  keenly  debating  the  news  and  what 
to  do  about  it,  the  elder  bird  fierce  to  stay,  the  younger 
bent  on  flight,  and  had  just  separated  to  different  win 
dows,  when  they  heard,  turned  and  beheld  him  there, 
a  stranger  in  tattered  gray  and  railway  dirt,  yet  their 
own  coxcomb  boy  from  his  curls  to  his  ill-shod  feet. 
Flora  had  hardly  caught  her  breath  or  believed  her 
eyes  before  the  grandmother  was  on  his  neck  patting 
and  petting  his  cheeks  and  head  and  plying  questions 
in  three  languages :  When,  where,  how,  why,  how,  where 
and  when? 

Dimly  he  reflected  their  fond  demonstrations.  No 
gladness  was  in  his  face.  His  speech,  as  hurried  as 
theirs,  answered  no  queries.  He  asked  loftily  for  air, 
soap,  water  and  the  privacy  of  his  own  room,  and 
when  they  had  followed  him  there  and  seen  him 
scour  face,  arms,  neck,  and  head,  rub  dry  and  resume 
his  jacket  and  belt,  he  had  grown  only  more  careworn 
and  had  not  yet  let  his  sister's  eyes  rest  on  his. 

He  had  but  a  few  hours  to  spend  in  the  city,  he  said; 
had  brought  despatches  and  must  carry  others  back 
by  the  next  train.  His  story,  he  insisted,  was  too  long 
to  tell  before  he  had  delivered  certain  battery  letters; 
one  to  Victorine,  two  to  Constance  Mandeville,  and 
so  on.  Here  was  one  to  Flora,  from  Captain  Irby; 
perhaps  the  story  was  in  it.  At  any  rate,  its  bearer 
must  rush  along  now.  He  toppled  his  " grannie"  into 
a  rocking-chair  and  started  away.  He  "would  be 
back  as  soon  as  ever  he " 

But  Flora  filled  the  doorway.  He  had  to  harden 
his  glance  to  hers  at  last.  In  her  breast  were  acutest 
emotions  widely  at  war,  yet  in  her  eyes  he  saw  only  an 

243 


KincaicTs  Battery 

unfeeling  light,  and  it  was  the  old  woman  behind  him 
who  alone  noted  how  painfully  the  girl's  fingers  were 
pinched  upon  Irby's  unopened  letter.  The  boy's 
stare  betrayed  no  less  anger  than  suffering  and  as 
Flora  spoke  he  flushed. 

"Charlie,"  she  melodiously  began,  but  his  outcry 
silenced  her: 

"Now,  by  the  eternal  great  God  Almighty,  Flora 
Valcour,  if  you  dare  to  ask  me  that — "  He  turned  to 
the  grandmother,  dropped  to  his  knees,  buried  his 
face  in  her  lap  and  sobbed. 

With  genuine  tenderness  she  stroked  his  locks. 
Yet  while  she  did  so  she  lifted  to  the  sister  a  face 
lighted  up  with  a  mirth  of  deliverance.  To  nod,  toss, 
and  nod  again,  was  poor  show  for  her  glee;  she  smirked 
and  writhed  to  the  disdaining  girl  like  a  child  at  a 
mirror,  and,  though  sitting  thus  confined,  gave  all  the 
effects  of  jigging  over  the  floor.  Hilary  out  of  the  way ! 
Kincaid  eliminated,  and  the  whole  question  free  of  him, 
this  inheritance  question  so  small  and  mean  to  all  but 
her  and  Irby,  but  to  him  and  her  so  large,  so  paramount ! 
Silently,  but  plainly  to  the  girl,  her  mouth  widely 
motioned,  "II  est  mort!  grace" — one  hand  stopped 
stroking  long  enough  to  make  merrily  the  sign  of 
cross — "grace  au  ciel,  il  est  mort!" 

No  moment  of  equal  bitterness  had  Flora  Valcour 
ever  known.  To  tell  half  her  distresses  would  lose 
us  in  their  tangle,  midmost  in  which  was  a  choking 
fury  against  the  man  whom  unwillingly  she  loved,  for 
escaping  her,  even  by  a  glorious  death.  One  thought 
alone — that  Anna,  as  truly  as  if  stricken  blind,  would 
sit  in  darkness  the  rest  of  her  days — lightened  her 

244 


Steve— Maxime— Charlie- 
torture,  and  with  that  thought  she  smiled  a  stony 
loathing  on  the  mincing  grandam  and  the  boy's  un- 
lifted  head.  Suddenly,  purpose  gleamed  from  her. 
She  could  not  break  forth  herself,  but  to  escape  suffo 
cation  she  must  and  would  procure  an  outburst  some 
where.  Measuredly,  but  with  every  nerve  and  tendon 
overstrung,  she  began  to  pace  the  room. 

"  Don't  cry,  Charlie,"  she  smoothly  said  in  a  voice 
as  cold  as  the  crawl  of  a  snake.  The  brother  knew  the 
tone,  had  known  it  from  childhood,  and  the  girl,  glanc 
ing  back  on  him,  was  pleased  to  see  him  stiffen.  A 
few  steps  on  she  added  pensively >  "For  a  soldier  to 
cry — and  befo'  ladies — a  ladies'  man — of  that  batt'rie 
— tha's  hardly  fair — to  the  ladies  eh,  grandmama?" 

But  the  boy  only  pressed  his  forehead  harder  down 
and  clutched  the  aged  knees  under  it  till  their  owner 
put  on,  to  the  scintillant  beauty,  a  look  of  alarm  and 
warning.  The  girl,  musingly  retracing  her  calculated 
steps  to  where  the  kneeler  seemed  to  clinch  himself  to 
his  posture,  halted,  stroked  with  her  slippered  toe  a 
sole  of  his  rude  shoes  and  spoke  once  more:  "Do  they 
oft-ten  boohoo  like  that,  grandma,  those  artillerie?" 

The  boy  whirled  up  with  the  old  woman  clinging. 
A  stream  of  oaths  and  curses  appallingly  original 
poured  from  him,  not  as  through  the  lips  alone  but 
from  his  very  eyes  and  nostrils.  That  the  girl  was 
first  of  all  a  fool  and  damned  was  but  a  trivial  part 
of  the  cry — of  the  explosion  of  his  whole  year's  mis 
taken  or  half-mistaken  inferences  and  smothered  in 
dignation.  With  equal  flatness  and  blindness  he  ac 
cused  her  of  rejoicing  in  the  death  of  Kincaid:  the 
noblest  captain  (he  ramped  on)  that  ever  led  a  battery; 

245 


Kincaid's  Battery 

kindest  friend  that  ever  ruled  a  camp;  gayest,  hottest, 
daringest  fighter  of  Shiloh's  field;  fiercest  for  man's 
purity  that  ever  loved  the  touch  of  women's  fingers; 
sternest  that  ever  wept  on  the  field  of  death  with  the 
dying  in  his  arms;  and  the  scornfullest  of  promotion 
that  ever  was  cheated  of  it  at  headquarters. 

All  these  extravagances  he  cursed  out,  too  witless 
to  see  that  this  same  hero  of  his  was  the  one  human 
being,  himself  barely  excepted,  for  whose  life  his  sister 
cared.  He  charged  her  of  never  having  forgiven 
Hilary  for  making  Anna  godmother  of  their  flag,  and 
of  being  in  some  dark  league  against  him — "hell  only 
knew  what" — along  with  that  snail  of  a  cousin  whom 
everybody  but  Kincaid  himself  and  the  silly  old  uncle 
knew  to  be  the  fallen  man's  most  venomous  foe. 
Throughout  the  storm  the  grandmother's  fingers  pattered 
soothing  caresses,  while  Flora  stood  as  unruffled  by 
his  true  surmises  as  by  any,  a  look  of  cold  interest  in 
her  narrowed  eyes,  and  her  whole  bodily  and  spiritual 
frame  drinking  relief  from  his  transport.  Now,  while 
he  still  raged,  she  tenderly  smiled  on  their  trembling 
ancestress. 

''Really,  you  know  grandmama,  sometimes  me  also 
I  feel  like  that,  when  to  smazh  the  furniture  't  would 
be  a  delightful — or  to  wring  somebody  the  neck,  yes. 
But  for  us,  and  to-day,  even  to  get  a  li'l'  mad,  how  is 
that  a  possibP?"  She  turned  again,  archly,  to  the 
brother,  but  flashed  in  alarm  and  sprang  toward  him. 

His  arm  stiffly  held  her  off.  With  failing  eyes  bent 
on  the  whimpering  grandmother  he  sighed  a  dis 
heartened  oath  and  threshed  into  a  chair  gasping — 

"My  wound — opened  again." 
246 


The  School  of  Suspense 
XLVI 

THE   SCHOOL  OF   SUSPENSE 

THUS  it  fell  to  Flora  to  be  letter-bearer  and  news- 
bearer  in  her  brother's  stead.  Yet  he  had  first  to  be 
cared  for  by  her  and  the  grandmother  in  a  day  long 
before  " first  aid"  had  become  common  knowledge. 
The  surgeon  they  had  hailed  in  had  taken  liberal  time 
to  show  them  how,  night  and  morning,  to  unbandage, 
cleanse  and  rebind,  and  to  tell  them  (smiling  into  the 
lad's  mutinous  eyes)  that  the  only  other  imperative 
need  was  to  keep  him  flat  on  his  back  for  ten  days. 
Those  same  weeks  of  downpour  which  had  given  the 
Shiloh  campaign  two-thirds  of  its  horrors  had  so  overfed 
the  monstrous  Mississippi  that  it  was  running  four 
miles  an  hour,  overlapping  its  levees  and  heaving  up 
through  the  wharves  all  along  the  city's  front,  until 
down  about  the  Convent  and  Barracks  and  Camp 
Callender  there  were  streets  as  miry  as  Corinth.  And 
because  each  and  all  of  these  hindrances  were  welcome 
to  Flora  as  giving  leisure  to  read  and  reread  Irby's 
long  letter  about  his  cousin  and  uncle,  and  to  plan  what 
to  say  and  do  in  order  to  reap  all  the  fell  moment's 
advantages,  the  shadows  were  long  in  the  Callender 's 
grove  when  she  finally  ascended  their  veranda  steps. 

She  had  come  round  by  way  of  Victorine's  small, 
tight-fenced  garden  of  crape-myrtles,  oleanders  and 
pomegranates — where  also  the  water  was  in  the  streets, 
backwater  from  the  overflowed  swamp-forests  be 
tween  city  and  lake — and  had  sent  her  to  Charlie's  bed 
side.  Pleasant  it  would  be  for  us  to  turn  back  with  the 

247 


KincaicTs  Battery 

damsel  and  see  her.  with  heart  as  open  as  her  arms, 
kiss  the  painted  gra-ndam,  and  at  once  proceed  to  make 
herself  practically  invaluable;  or  to  observe  her  every 
now  and  then  dazzle  her  adored  patient  with  a  tear- 
gem  of  joy  or  pity,  or  of  gratitude  that  she  lived  in  a 
time  when  heroic  things  could  happen  right  at  home 
and  to  the  lowliest,  even  to  her;  sweet  woes  like  this, 
that  let  down,  for  virtuous  love,  the  barriers  of  hum 
drum  convention.  But  Flora  draws  us  on,  she  and 
Anna.  As  she  touched  the  bell-knob  Constance  sprang 
out  to  welcome  her,  though  not  to  ask  her  in — till  she 
could  have  a  word  with  her  alone,  the  young  wife  ex 
plained. 

"I  saw  you  coming,"  she  said,  drawing  her  out  to 
the  balustrade.  "You  didn't  get  Anna's  note  of  last 
night — too  bad!  I've  just  found  out — her  maid  for 
got  it!  What  do  you  reckon  we've  been  doing  all  day 
long?  Packing!  We're  going  we  don't  know  where! 
Vicksburg,  Jackson,  Meridian,  Mobile,  wherever  Anna 
can  best  hunt  Hilary  from — and  Charlie  too,  of  course." 

"Yes,"  said  Flora,  one  way  to  the  speaker  and  quite 
another  way  to  herself. 

"Yes,  she  wants  to  do  it,  and  Doctor  Sevier  says 
it's  the  only  thing  for  her.  Ah,  Flora,  how  well  you 
can  understand  that!" 

"Indeed,  yes,"  sighed  the  listener,  both  ways  again. 

"We  know  how  absolutely  you  believe  the  city's 
our  best  base,  else  we'd  have  asked  you  to  go  with  as." 
The  ever  genuine  Constance  felt  a  mortifying  specious- 
ness  in  her  words  and  so  piled  them  on.  "We,  know 
the  city  is  best — unless  it  should  fall,  and  it  won't — 
oh»  it  won't,  God's  not  going  to  let  so  many  prayers 

248 


The  School  of  Suspense 

go  unanswered,  Flora!  But  we've  tossed  reason  aside 
and  are  going  by  instinct,  the  way  I  always  feel  safest 
in,  dear.  Ah,  poor  Anna!  Oh,  Flora,  she's  so  sweet 
about  it!" 

"Yes?    Ab-out  what?" 

"You,  dear,  and  whoever  is  suffering  the  same " 

Flora  softly  winced  and  Constance  blamed  herself 
so  to  have  pained  another  sister's  love.  "And  she's 
so  quiet,"  added  the  speaker,  "but,  oh,  so  pale — and 
so  hard  either  to  comfort  or  encourage,  or  even  to  dis 
courage.  There's  nothing  you  can  say  that  she  isn't 
already  heart-sick  of  saying  herself,  to  herself,  and  I 
beg  you,  dear,  in  your  longing  to  comfort  her,  please 
don't  bring  up  a  single  maybe-this  or  maybe-that; 
any  hope,  I  mean,  founded  on  a  mere  doubt." 

"Ah,  but  sometime'  the  doubt — it  is  the  hope!" 
"Yes,  sometimes;  but  not  to  her,  any  more.  Oh, 
Flora,  if  it's  just  as  true  of  you,  you  won't  be — begrudge 
my  saying  it  of  my  sister — that  no  saint  ever  went  to 
her  matyrdom  better  prepared  than  she  is,  right  now, 
for  the  very  worst  that  can  be  told.  There's  only  one 
thing  to  which  she  never  can  and  never  will  resign  her 
self,  and  that  is  doubt.  She  can't  breathe  its  air, 
Flora.  As  she  says  herself,  she  isn't  so  built;  she  hasn't 
that  gift." 

The  musing  Flora  nodded  compassionately,  but 
inwardly  she  said  that,  gift  or  no  gift,  Anna  should 
serve  her  time  in  Doubting  Castle,  with  her,  Flora,  for 
turnkey.  Suddenly  she  put  away  her  abstraction  and 
with  a  summarizing  gesture  and  chastened  twinkle 
spoke  out:  "In  short,  you  want  to  know  for  w'at  am 
I  come." 

249 


Kincaid's  Battery 


"  Flora "•' 

"Ah,  but,  my  dear,  you  are  ri-ight.  That  is  'all 
correct,'  as  they  say,  and  one  thing  I'm  come  for — 't 
is — "  She  handed  out  Mandeville's  two  letters. 

The  wife  caught  them  to  her  bosom,  sprang  to  her 
tiptoes,  beamed  on  the  packet  a  second  time  and  read 
aloud,  ''Urbanity  of  Corporal  ValcourP  She  heaved 
an  ecstatic  breath  to  speak  on,  but  failed.  Anna  and 
Miranda  had  joined  them  and  Flora  had  risen  from 
her  seat  on  the  balustrade,  aware  at  once  that  the  role 
she  had  counted  on  was  not  to  be  hers,  the  role  of  com 
forter  to  an  undone  rival. 

Pale  indeed  was  the  rival,  pale  as  rivalry  could  wish. 
Yet  instantly  Flora  saw,  with  a  fiery  inward  sting, 
how  beautiful  pallor  may  be.  And  more  she  saw. 
with  the  chagrin  then  growing  so  common  on  every 
armed  front — the  chagrin  of  finding  one's  foe  en 
trenched — she  saw  how  utterly  despair  had  failed  to 
crush  a  gentle  soul.  Under  cover  of  affliction's  night 
and  storm  Anna,  this  whole  Anna  Callender,  had  been 
reinforced,  had  fortified  and  was  a  new  problem. 

She  greeted  Flora  with  a  welcoming  beam,  but  be 
fore  speaking  she  caught  her  sister's  arm  and  glanced 
herself,  at  the  superscription. 

" Flora i"  she  softly  cried,  "oh,  Flora  Valcour!  has 
your  brother — your  Charlie! — come  home  alive  and 
well?— What;  no?— No,  he  has  not?" 

The  visitor  was  shaking  her  head:  "No.  Ah,  no! 
home,  yes,  and  al-ive;  but " 

"Oh,  Flora,  Flora!  alive  and  at  home!  home  and 
alive!"  While  the  words  came  their  speaker  slowly 
folded  her  arms  about  the  bearer  of  tidings,  and  with 

250 


From  the  Burial  Squad 

a  wholly  unwonted  strength  pressed  her  again  to  the 
rail  and  drew  bosom  to  bosom,  still  exclaiming,  "  Alive! 
alive!  Oh,  whatever  his  plight,  be  thankful,  Flora,  for 
so  much!  Alive  enough  to  come  home!" 


XLVII 

FROM  THE  BURIAL  SQUAD 

THE  pinioned  girl  tried  to  throw  back  her  head 
and  bring  their  eyes  together,  but  Anna,  through  some 
unconscious  advantage,  held  it  to  her  shoulder,  her 
own  face  looking  out  over  the  garden. 

"Ah,  let  me  be  glad  for  you,  Flora,  let  me  be  glad 
for  you!  Oh,  think  of  it!  You  have  him!  have  him 
at  home,  to  look  upon,  to  touch,  to  call  by  name!  and 
to  be  looked  upon  by  him  and  touched  and  called  by 
name!  Oh,  God  in  heaven!  God  in  heaven!" 

Miranda's  fond  protests  were  too  timorous  to  check 
her,  and  Flora's  ceased  in  the  delight  of  hearing  that 
last  wail  confess  the  thought  of  Hilary.  Constance 
strove  with  tender  energy  for  place  and  voice:  "Nan, 
dearie,  Nan!  But  listen  to  Flora,  Nan.  See,  Nan, 
I  haven't  opened  Steve's  letter  yet.  Wounded  and 
what,  Flora,  something  worse?  Ah,  if  worse  you 
couldn't  have  left  him." 

"I  know,"  sighed  Anna,  relaxing  her  arms  to  a  caress 
and  turning  her  gaze  to  Flora.  "I  see.  Your  brother, 
our  dear  Charlie,  has  come  back  to  life,  but  wounded 
and  alone.  Alone.  Hilary  is  still  missing.  Isn't  that 
it?  That's  all,  isn't  it?" 

Constance,  in  a  sudden  thought  of  what  her  letters 

251 


Kincaid's  Battery 

might  tell,  began  to  open  one,  though  with  her  eyes  at 
every  alternate  moment  on  Flora  as  eagerly  as  Miranda's 
or  Anna's.  Flora  stood  hiddenly  revelling  in  that  com 
plexity  of  her  own  spirit  which  enabled  her  to  pour 
upon  her  questioner  a  look,  even  a  real  sentiment,  of 
ravishing  pity,  while  nevertheless  in  the  depths  of  her 
being  she  thrilled  and  burned  and  danced  and  sang 
with  joy  for  the  very  misery  she  thus  compassionated. 
By  a  designed  motion  she  showed  her  grandmother's 
reticule  on  her  arm.  But  only  Anna  saw  it;  Constance, 
with  her  gaze  in  the  letter,  was  drawing  Miranda  aside 
while  both  bent  their  heads  over  a  clause  in  it  which 
had  got  blurred,  and  looked  at  each  other  aghast  as  they 
made  it  out  to  read,  " '  — from  the  burial  squad.' "  The 
grandmother's  silken  bag  saved  them  from  Anna's  notice. 

"Oh,  Flora!"  said  Anna  again,  "is  there  really 
something  worse?"  Abruptly,  she  spread  a  hand 
under  the  bag  and  with  her  eyes  still  in  the  eyes  of  its 
possessor  slid  it  gently  from  the  yielding  wrist.  Drop 
ping  her  fingers  into  it  she  brought  forth  a  tobacco- 
pouch,  of  her  own  embroidering,  and  from  it,  while 
the  reticule  fell  unheeded  to  the  floor,  drew  two  or 
three  small  things  which  she  laid  on  it  in  her  doubled 
hands  and  regarded  with  a  smile.  Vacantly  the  smile 
increased  as  she  raised  it  to  Flora,  then  waned  while 
she  looked  once  more  on  the  relics,  and  grew  again  as 
she  began  to  handle  them.  Her  slow  voice  took  the 
tone  of  a  child  alone  at  play. 

"Why,  that's  my  photograph,"  she  said.  "And 
this — this  is  his  watch — watch  and  chain."  She 
dangled  them.  A  light  frown  came  and  went  between 
her  smiles. 

252 


From  the  Burial  Squad 

With  soft  eagerness  Flora  called  Constance,  and  the 
sister  and  Miranda  stood  dumb. 

"See,  Connie,"  the  words  went  on,  "see,  'Randa, 
this  is  my  own  photograph,  and  this  is  his  own  watch 
and  chain.  I  must  go  and  put  them  away — with 
my  old  gems."  Constance  would  have  followed  her 
as  she  moved  but  she  waved  a  limp  forbiddal,  prattling 
on:  "This  doesn't  mean  he's  dead,  you  know.  Oh, 
not  at  all!  It  means  just  the  contrary!  Why,  I  saw 
him  alive  last  night,  in  a  dream,  and  I  can't  believe 
anything  else,  and  I  won't!  No,  no,  not  yet!"  At 
that  word  she  made  a  misstep  and  as  she  started  sharply 
to  recover  it  the  things  she  carried  fell  breaking  and 
jingling  at  her  feet. 

"Oh-h!"  she  sighed  in  childish  surprise  and  feebly 
dropped  to  her  knees.  Flora,  closest  by,  sprang 
crouching  to  the  rescue,  but  recoiled  as  the  kneeling 
girl  leaned  hoveringly  over  the  mementos  and  with  dis 
tended  eyes  and  an  arm  thrust  forward  cried  aloud, 
"No!No!No-o!" 

At  once,  however,  her  voice  was  tender  again. 
"Mustn't  anybody  touch  them  but  me,  ever  any  more," 
she  said,  regathering  the  stuff,  regained  her  feet  and 
moved  on.  Close  after  her  wavering  steps  anxiously 
pressed  the  others,  yet  not  close  enough.  At  the  open 
door,  smiling  back  in  rejection  of  their  aid,  she  tripped, 
and  before  they  could  save  her,  tumbled  headlong 
within.  From  up-stairs,  from  down-stairs  came  ser 
vants  running,  and  by  the  front  door  entered  a  stranger, 
a  private  soldier  in  swamp  boots  and  bespattered  with 
the  mire  of  the  river  road  from  his  spurs  to  his  ragged  hat. 

"No,  bring  her  out,"  he  said  to  a   slave   woman 

253 


Kincaid's  Battery 

who  bore  Anna  in  her  arms,  "out  to  the  air!"  But  the 
burden  slipped  free  and  with  a  cleared  mind  stood  facing 
him. 

"Ladies,"  he  exclaimed,  his  look  wandering,  his 
uncovered  hair  matted,  "if  a  half-starved  soldier  can 
have  a  morsel  of  food  just  to  take  in  his  hands  and 
ride  on  with — "  and  before  he  could  finish  servants 
had  sprung  to  supply  him. 

"Are  you  from  down  the  river?"  asked  Anna, 
quietly  putting  away  her  sister's  pleading  touch  and 
Flora's  offer  of  support. 

"I  am!"  spouted  the  renegade,  for  renegade  he 
was,  "I'm  from  the  very  thick  of  the  massacre!  from 
day  turned  into  night,  night  into  day,  and  heaven  and 
earth  into — into " 

"Hell,"  placidly  prompted  Flora. 

"Yes!  nothing  short  of  it!  Our  defenses  become 
death-traps  and  slaughter-pens — oh,  how  foully,  foully 
has  Richmond  betrayed  her  sister  city!" 

Flora  felt  a  new  tumult  of  joy.  "That  Yankee 
fleet — it  has  pazz'  those  fort'?"  she  cried. 

"My  dear  young  lady!  By  this  time  there  ain't  no 
forts  for  it  to  pass!  When  I  left  Fort  St.  Philip  there 
wa'n't  a  spot  over  in  Fort  Jackson  as  wide  as  my 
blanket  where  a  bumbshell  hadn't  buried  itself  and 
blown  up,  and  every  minute  we  were  lookin'  for  the 
magazine  to  go !  Those  awful  shells !  they'd  torn  both 
levees,  the  forts  were  flooded,  men  who'd  lost  their  grit 
were  weeping  like  children " 

"Oh!"  interrupted  Constance,  "why  not  leave  the 
forts?  We  don't  need  them  now;  those  old  wooden 
ships  can  never  withstand  our  terrible  ironclads!" 

254 


From  the  Burial  Squad 

"Well,  they're  mighty  soon  going  to  try  it!  Last 
night,  right  in  the  blaze  of  all  our  batteries,  they  cut 
the  huge  chain  we  had  stretched  across  the  river " 

"Ah,  but  when  they  see —  oh,  they'll  never  dare 
face  even  the  Manassas — the  'little  turtle/  ha-ha! — 
much  less  the  great  Louisiana!" 

"Alas!  madam,  the  Louisiana  ain't  ready  for  'em. 
There  she  lies  tied  to  the  levee,  with  engines  that  can't 
turn  a  wheel,  a  mere  floating  battery,  while  our  gun 
boats — "  Eagerly  the  speaker  broke  off  to  receive 
upon  one  hand  and  arm  the  bounty  of  the  larder  and 
with  a  pomp  of  gratitude  to  extend  his  other  hand  to 
Anna;  but  she  sadly  shook  her  head  and  showed  on 
her  palms  Hilary's  shattered  tokens: 

"These  poor  things  belong  to  one,  sir,  who,  like 
you,  is  among  the  missing.  But,  oh,  thank  God!  he 
is  missing  at  the  front,  in  the  front." 

The  abashed  craven  turned  his  hand  to  Flora,  but 
with  a  gentle  promptness  Anna  stepped  between: 
"No,  Flora  dear,  see;  he  hasn't  a  red  scratch  on  him. 
Oh,  sir,  go — eat!  If  hunger  stifles  courage,  eat!  But 
eat  as  you  ride,  and  ride  like  mad  back  to  duty  and 
honor!  No!  not  under  this  roof — nor  in  sight  of  these 
things — can  any  man  be  a  ladies'  man,  who  is  missing 
from  the  front,  at  the  rear." 

He  wheeled  and  vanished.  Anna  turned:  "Connie, 
what  do  your  letters  say?" 

The  sister's  eyes  told  enough.  The  inquirer  gazed 
a  moment,  then  murmured  to  herself,  "I — don't — 
believe  it — yet,"  grew  very  white,  swayed,  and  sank 
with  a  long  sigh  into  out-thrown  arms. 


255 


Kincaid's  Battery 
XLVIII 

FARRAGUT 

THE  cathedral  clock  struck  ten  of  the  night.  Yonder 
its  dial  shone,  just  across  that  quarter  of  Jackson  Square 
nearest  the  Valcours'  windows,  getting  no  response 
this  time  except  the  watchman's  three  taps  of  his  iron- 
shod  club  on  corner  curbstones. 

An  hour  earlier  its  toll  had  been  answered  from 
near  and  far,  up  and  down  the  long,  low-roofed,  curv 
ing  and  recurving  city — "seven,  eight,  nine" — " eight, 
nine" — the  law's  warning  to  all  slaves  to  be  indoors 
or  go  to  jail.  Not  Flora  nor  Anna  nor  Victorine  nor 
Doctor  Sevier  nor  Dick  Smith's  lone  mother  nor  any 
one  else  among  all  those  thousands  of  masters,  mis 
tresses  and  man-  and  maid-servants,  or  these  thousands 
of  home-guards  at  home  under  their  mosquito-bars, 
with  uniforms  on  bedside  chairs  and  with  muskets  and 
cartridge-belts  close  by — not  one  of  all  these  was 
aware,  I  say,  that  however  else  this  awful  war  might 
pay  its  cost,  it  was  the  knell  of  slavery  they  heard,  and 
which  they,  themselves,  in  effect,  were  sounding. 

Lacking  wilder  excitement  Madame  sat  by  a  lamp 
knitting  a  nubia.  Victorine  had  flown  home  at  sun 
down.  Charlie  lay  sleeping  as  a  soldier  lad  can.  His 
sister  had  not  yet  returned  from  Callender  House, 
but  had  been  fully  accounted  for  some  time  before  by 
messenger.  Now  the  knitter  heard  horses  and  wheels. 
Why  should  they  come  at  a  walk  ?  It  was  like  stealth. 
They  halted  under  the  balcony.  She  slipped  out  and 
peered  down.  Yes,  there  was  Flora.  Constance  was  with 

256 


Farragut 

her.  Also  two  trim  fellows  whom  she  rightly  guessed 
to  be  Camp  Callender  lads,  and  a  piece  of  luggage- 
was  it  not? — which,  as  they  lifted  it  down,  revealed  a 
size  and  weight  hard  even  for  those  siege-gunners  to 
handle  with  care.  Unseen,  silently,  they  came  in  and  up 
with  it,  led  by  Flora.  (Camp  Callender  was  now  only 
a  small  hither  end  of  the  "  Chalmette  Batteries,"  which 
on  both  sides  of  the  river  mounted  a  whole  score  of  big 
black  guns.  No  wonder  the  Callenders  were  leaving.) 

Presently  here  were  the  merry  burden-bearers  be 
hind  their  radiant  guide,  whispered  ah's  and  oh's 
and  wary  laughter  abounding. 

"'Such  a  getting  up-stairs  I  never  did  see!'" 

A  thousand  thanks  to  the  boys  as  they  set  down  their 
load;  their  thanks  back  for  seats  declined;  no  time 
even  to  stand;  a  moment,  only,  for  new  vows  of  secrecy. 
"Oui!— Ah,  non !— Assure'ment !  "  (They  were  Cre 
oles.)  "Yes,  mum  't  is  the  word!  And  such  a  so- 
quiet  getting  down-stair'!" — to  Mrs.  Mandeville  again 
— and  trundling  away! 

When  the  church  clock  gently  mentioned  the  half- 
hour  the  newly  gleeful  grandam  and  hiddenly  tortured 
girl  had  been  long  enough  together  and  alone  for  the 
elder  to  have  nothing  more  to  ask  as  to  this  chest  of 
plate  which  the  Callenders  had  fondly  accepted  Flora's 
offer  to  keep  for  them  while  they  should  be  away. 
Not  for  weeks  and  weeks  had  the  old  lady  felt  such  ease 
of  mind  on  the  money — and  bread — question.  Now 
the  two  set  about  to  get  the  booty  well  hid  before 
Charlie  should  awake.  This  required  the  box  to  be 
emptied,  set  in  place  and  reladen,  during  which  proc 
ess  Flora  spoke  only  when  stung. 

257 


Kincaid's  Battery 

"Ah!"  thinly  piped  she  of  the  mosquito  voice,  "what 
a  fine  day  tha's  been,  to-day!"  but  won  no  reply. 
Soon  she  cheerily  whined  again : 

"All  day  nothing  but  good  luck,  and  at  the  end — 
this!"  (the  treasure  chest). 

But  Flora  kept  silence. 

"So,  now,  said  the  aged  one,  "they  will  not  make 
such  a  differenze,  those  old  jewel'." 

"I  will  get  them  yet,"  murmured  the  girl. 

"You  think?    Me,  I  think  no,  you  will  never." 

No  response. 

The  tease  pricked  once  more:  "Ah!  all  that  day  I 
am  thinking  of  that  Irbee.  I  am  glad  for  Irbee.  He 
is  'the  man  that  waits/  that  Irbee!" 

The  silent  one  winced;  fiercely  a  piece  of  the  shining 
ware  was  lifted  high,  but  it  sank  again.  The  painted 
elder  cringed.  There  may  have  been  genuine  peril, 
but  the  one  hot  sport  in  her  fag  end  of  a  life  was  to  play 
with  this  beautiful  fire.  She  held  the  girl's  eye  with  a 
look  of  frightened  admiration,  murmuring,  "You  are 
a  merveilleuse  I " 

"Possible?" 

"Yes,  to  feel  that  way  and  same  time  to  be  ab'e  to 
smile  like  that!" 

"Ah?  how  is  that  I'm  feeling?" 

"You  are  filling  that  all  this,  and  all  those  jewel* 
of  Anna,  and  the  life  of  me,  and  of  that  boy  in  yond', 
you  would  give  them  all,  juz'  to  be  ab'e  to  bil-ieve 
that  foolishness  of  Anna — that  he's  yet  al-live,  that 
Kin " 

The  piece  of  plate  half  rose  again,  but — in  part 
because  the  fair  threatener  could  not  help  enjoying 

258 


Farragut 

the  subtlety  of  the  case — the  smile  persisted  as  she 
rejoined,  "Ah!  when  juz'  for  the  fun,  all  I  can  get 
the  chance,  I'm  making  her  to  bil-ieve  that  way!" 

"Yes,"  laughed  the  old  woman,  "but  why?  Only 
biccause  that  way  you,  you  cannot  bil-ieve." 

The  lithe  maiden  arose  to  resume  their  task,  the 
heavy  silver  still  in  her  hand.  The  next  moment  the 
kneeling  grandam  crouched  and  the  glittering  metal 
swept  around  just  high  enough  to  miss  her  head.  A 
tinkle  of  mirth  came  from  its  wielder  as  she  moved 
on  with  it,  sighing,  "Ah!  ho!  what  a  pity — that  so 
seldom  the  aged  commit  suicide." 

"Yes,"  came  the  soft  retort,  "but  for  yo'  young 
grandmama  tha'z  not  yet  the  time,  she  is  still  a  so 
indispensib'." 

"Very  true,  ma  chere,"  sang  Flora,  "and  in  heaven 
you  would  be  so  uzeless." 

Out  in  the  hazy,  dark,  heavily  becalmed  night  the 
clock  tolled  eleven.  Eleven — one — three — and  all  the 
hours,  halves  and  quarters  between  and  beyond,  it 
tolled;  and  Flora,  near,  and  Anna,  far,  sometimes 
each  by  her  own  open  window,  heard  and  counted. 
A  thin  old  moon  was  dimly  rising  down  the  river 
when  each  began  to  think  she  caught  another  and 
very  different  sound  that  seemed  to  arrive  faint  from 
a  long  journey  out  of  the  southeast,  if  really  from  any 
where,  and  to  pulse  in  dim  persistency  as  soft  as 
breathing,  but  as  constant.  Likely  enough  it  was 
only  the  rumble  of  a  remote  storm  and  might  have 
seemed  to  come  out  of  the  north  or  west  had  their  win 
dows  looked  that  way,  for  still  the  tempestuous  rains 
were  frequent  and  everywhere,  and  it  was  easy  and 

259 


Kincaid's  Battery 

common  for  man  to  mistake  God's  thunderings  for 
his  own. 

Yet,  whether  those  two  wakeful  maidens  truly 
heard  or  merely  fancied,  in  fact  just  then  some  seventy 
miles  straight  away  under  that  gaunt  old  moon,  there 
was  rising  to  heaven  the  most  terrific  uproar  this 
delta  land  had  ever  heard  since  man  first  moved  upon 
its  shores  and  waters.  Six  to  the  minute  bellowed 
and  soared  Porter's  awful  bombs  and  arched  and 
howled  and  fell  and  scattered  death  and  conflagration. 
While  they  roared,  three  hundred  and  forty  great  guns 
beside,  on  river  and  land,  flashed  and  crashed,  the 
breezeless  night  by  turns  went  groping-black  and  clear- 
as-day  red  with  smoke  and  flame  of  vomiting  funnels, 
of  burning  boats  and  fire-rafts,  of  belching  cannon,  of 
screaming  grape  and  canister  and  of  exploding  maga 
zines.  And  through  the  middle  of  it  all,  in  single  file — 
their  topmasts,  yards,  and  cordage  showing  above  the 
murk  as  pale  and  dumb  as  skeletons  at  every  flare  of 
the  havoc,  a  white  light  twinkling  at  each  masthead,  a 
red  light  at  the  peak  and  the  stars  and  stripes  there  with 
it — Farragut  and  his  wooden  ships  came  by  the  forts. 

"Boys,  our  cake's  all  dough!"  said  a  commander  in 
one  of  the  forts. 

When  day  returned  and  Anna  and  Flora  slept,  the 
murmur  they  had  heard  may  after  all  have  been  only 
God's  thunder  and  really  not  from  the  southeast;  but 
just  down  there  under  the  landscape's  flat  rim  both 
forts,  though  with  colors  still  gallantly  flying,  were  smok 
ing  ruins,  all  Dixie's  brave  gunboats  and  rams  lay  along 
the  river's  two  shores,  sunken  or  burned,  and  the  whole 
victorious  Northern  fleet,  save  one  boat  rammed  and 

260 


A  City  in  Terror 

gone  to  the  bottom,  was  on  its  cautious,  unpiloted 
way,  snail-slow  but  fate-sure,  up  the  tawny  four-mile 
current  and  round  the  gentle  green  bends  of  the  Missis 
sippi  with  New  Orleans  for  its  goal  and  prey. 


XLIX 

A  CITY  IN  TERROR 

BEFORE  the  smart-stepping  lamplighters  were  half 
done  turning  off  the  street  lights,  before  the  noisy 
market-houses  all  over  the  town,  from  Camp  Callender 
to  Carrollton,  with  their  basket-bearing  thousands  of 
jesting  and  dickering  customers,  had  quenched  their 
gaslights  and  candles  to  dicker  and  jest  by  day,  or 
the  devotees  of  early  mass  had  emerged  from  the 
churches,  Rumor  was  on  the  run.  With  a  sort  of 
muffled  speed  and  whisper  she  came  and  went,  crossed 
her  course  and  reaffirmed  herself,  returned  to  her 
starting-point  and  stole  forth  again,  bearing  ever  the 
same  horrid  burden,  brief,  persistent,  unexaggerated : 
The  Foe!  The  Foe!  In  five  great  ships  and  twice 
as  many  lesser  ones — counted  at  Quarantine  Station 
just  before  the  wires  were  cut — the  Foe  was  hardly 
twenty  leagues  away,  while  barely  that  many  guns  of 
ours  crouched  between  his  eight  times  twenty  and  our 
hundred  thousand  women  and  children. 

Yet,  for  a  brief  spell,  so  deep  are  the  ruts  of  habit, 
the  city  kept  to  its  daily  routine,  limp  and  unmean 
ing  though  much  of  it  had  come  to  be.  The  milkman, 
of  course,  held  to  his  furious  round  in  his  comical  two- 
wheeled  cart,  whirling  up  to  alley  gates,  shouting  and 

261 


Kincaid's  Battery 

ringing  his  big  hand-bell.  In  all  his  tracks  followed 
the  hooded  bread-cart,  with  its  light-weight  loaves  for 
worthless  money  and  with  only  the  staggering  news  for 
lagnappe.  Families  ate  breakfast,  one  hour  and  an 
other,  wherever  there  was  food.  Day  cabmen  and 
draymen  trotted  off  to  their  curbstones;  women  turned  to 
the  dish-pan,  the  dust-pan,  the  beds,  the  broom;  porters, 
clerks  and  merchants — the  war-mill's  wasteful  refuse 
and  residuum,  some  as  good  as  the  gray  army's  best, 
some  poor  enough — went  to  their  idle  counters,  desks 
and  sidewalks;  the  children  to  the  public  schools,  the 
beggar  to  the  church  doorstep,  physicians  to  their  sick, 
the  barkeeper  to  his  mirrors  and  mint,  and  the  pot- 
fisher  to  his  catfish  lines  in  the  swollen,  sweeping, 
empty  harbor. 

But  besides  the  momentum  of  habit  there  was  the 
official  pledge  to  the  people — Mayor  Monroe's  and 
Commanding- General  Lovell's — that  if  they  would 
but  keep  up  this  tread-mill  gait,  the  moment  the  city 
was  really  in  danger  the  wires  of  the  new  fire-alarm 
should  strike  the  tidings  from  all  her  steeples.  So 
the  school  teachers  read  Scripture  and  prayers  and  the 
children  sang  the  "  Bonnie  Blue  Flag,"  while  outside 
the  omnibuses  trundled,  the  one-mule  street-cars 
tinkled  and  jogged  and  the  bells  hung  mute. 

Nevertheless  a  change  was  coming.  Invisibly  it 
worked  in  the  general  mind  as  that  mind  gradually 
took  in  the  meanings  of  the  case;  but  visibly  it  showed 
as,  from  some  outpost  down  the  river,  General  Lovell, 
(a  sight  to  behold  for  the  mud  on  him),  came  spurring 
at  full  speed  by  Callender  House,  up  through  the  Creole 
Quarter  and  across  wide  Canal  Street  to  the  St.  Charles. 

262 


A  City  in  Terror 

Now  even  more  visibly  it  betrayed  itself,  where  all 
through  the  heart  of  the  town  began  aides,  couriers 
and  frowning  adjutants  to  gallop  from  one  significant 
point  to  another.  Before  long  not  a  cab  anywhere 
waited  at  its  stand.  Every  one  held  an  officer  or  two, 
if  only  an  un-uniformed  bank-officer  or  captain  of  police, 
and  rattled  up  or  down  this  street  and  that,  taking 
corners  at  breakneck  risks.  That  later  the  drays 
began  to  move  was  not  so  noticeable,  for  a  dray  was 
but  a  dray  and  they  went  off  empty  except  for  their 
drivers  and  sometimes  a  soldier  with  a  musket  and  did 
not  return.  Moreover,  as  they  went  there  began  to  be 
seen  from  the  middle  of  almost  any  cross-street,  in 
the  sky  out  over  the  river  front,  here  one,  there  another, 
yonder  a  third  and  fourth,  upheaval  of  dense,  unusual 
smoke,  first  on  the  hither  side  of  the  harbor,  then  on 
the  far  side,  yet  no  fire-engines,  hand  or  steam,  rushed 
that  way,  nor  any  alarm.' sounded. 

From  the  Valcours'  balcony  Madame,  gasping  for 
good  air  after  she  and  Flora  had  dressed  Charlie's 
wound,  was  startled  to  see  one  of  those  black  columns 
soar  aloft.  But  it  was  across  the  river,  and  she  had 
barely  turned  within  to  mention  it,  when  up  the  stair 
and  in  upon  the  three  rushed  Victorine,  all  tears,  saying 
it  was  from  the  great  dry-dock  at  Slaughter-House 
Point,  which  our  own  authorities  had  set  afire. 

The  enfeebled  Charlie  half  started  from  his  rocking- 
chair  laughing  angrily.  "Incredible!"  he  cried,  but 
sat  mute  as  the  girl's  swift  tongue  told  the  half-dozen 
other  dreadful  things  she  had  just  beheld  on  either 
side  the  water.  The  sister  and  grandmother  sprang 
into  the  balcony  and  stood  astounded.  Out  of  the  nar- 

263 


KincaicTs  Battery 

row  streets  beneath  them — Chartres,  Conde,  St.  Peter, 
St.  Ann,  Cathedral  Alley — scores  and  scores  of  rapidly 
walking  men  and  women  and  scampering  boys  and  girls 
streamed  round  and  through  the  old  Square  by  every 
practicable  way  and  out  upon  the  levee. 

"Incredib'!"  retorted  meanwhile  the  pouting  daugh 
ter  of  Maxime,  pressing  into  the  balcony  after  Flora. 
"Hah!  and  look  yondah  another  incredib'!"  She 
pointed  riverward  across  the  Square. 

"Charlie,  you  must  not!"  cried  Flora,  returning 
half  into  the  room. 

"Bah!"  retorted  the  staggering  boy,  pushed  out 
among  them  and  with  profane  mutterings  stood  agaze. 

Out  across  the  Square  and  the  ever-multiplying 
flow  of  people  through  and  about  it,  and  over  the  roof 
of  the  French  Market  close  beyond,  the  rigging  of  a 
moored  ship  stood  pencilled  on  the  sky.  It  had  long 
been  a  daily  exasperation  to  his  grandmother's  vision, 
being  (unknown  to  Charlie  or  Victorine),  the  solitary 
winnings  of  Flora's  privateering  venture,  early  sold, 
you  will  remember,  but,  by  default  of  a  buyer,  still  in 
some  share  unnegotiably  hers  and — in  her  own  and 
the  grandmother's  hungry  faith — sure  to  command 
triple  its  present  value  the  moment  the  fall  of  the  city 
should  open  the  port.  Suddenly  the  old  lady  wheeled 
upon  Flora  with  a  frantic  look,  but  was  checked  by 
the  granddaughter's  gleaming  eyes  and  one  inaudible, 
visible  word:  "Hush!" 

The  gazing  boy  saw  only  the  ship.  "Oh,  great 
Lord!"  he  loathingly  drawled,  "is  it  Damned  Fools' 
Day  again?"  Her  web  of  cordage  began  to  grow 
dim  in  a  rising  smoke,  and  presently  a  gold  beading 

264 


A  City  in  Terror 

of  fire  ran  up  and  along  every  rope  and  spar  and  clung 
quivering.  Soon  the  masts  commenced,  it  seemed,  to 
steal  nearer  to  each  other,  and  the  vessel  swung  out 
from  her  berth  and  started  down  the  wide,  swift  river, 
a  mass  of  flames. 

''Oh,  Mother  of  God,"  cried  Victorine  with  a  new 
gush  of  tears!  "'ave  mercy  upon  uz  women!"  and  in 
the  midst  of  her  appeal  the  promised  alarum  began 
to  toll — here,  yonder,  and  far  away — here,  yonder,  and 
far  away — and  did  not  stop  until  right  in  the  middle 
of  the  morning  it  had  struck  twelve. 

"Good-by!  poor  betrayed  New  Orleans'"  exclaimed 
Charlie,  turning  back  into  the  room.  "Good-by, 
sweetheart,  I'm  off'  Good-by,  grannie — Flo'!" 

The  three  followed  in  with  cries  of  amazement,  dis 
tress,  indignation,  command,  reproach,  entreaty,  all 
alike  vain.  As  if  the  long-roll  of  his  own  brigade 
were  roaring  to  him,  he  strode  about  the  apartment 
preparing  to  fly. 

His  sister  tried  to  lay  preventing  hands  on  him,  say 
ing,  "Your  life!  your  life!  you  are  throwing  it  away  I " 

"Well,  what  am  I  in  Kincaid's  Battery  for?"  he 
retorted,  with  a  sweep  of  his  arm  that  sent  her  stag 
gering.  He  caught  the  younger  girl  by  the  shoulders: 
"Jularkie,  if  you  want  to  go,  too,  with  or  without 
grannie  and  Flo',  by  Jove,  come  along!  I'll  take  care 
of  you!" 

The  girl's  eyes  melted  with  yearning,  but  the  response 
was  Flora's:  "Simpleton!  When  you  have  n'  the 
sense  enough  to  take  care  of  yourself!" 

"Ah,  shame!"  ventured  the  sweetheart.  "He's  the 
lover  of  his  blidding  country,  going  ag-ain  to  fighd 

265 


Kincaid's  Battery 

for  her — and  uz — whiles  he  can! — to-day! — al-lone! 
— now!"  Her  fingers  clutched  his  wrists,  that  still 
held  her  shoulders,  and  all  her  veins  surged  in  the 
rapture  of  his  grasp. 

But  Charlie  stared  at  his  sister.  It  could  not  enter 
hib  mind  that  her  desires  were  with  the  foe,  yet  his  voice 
went  deep  in  scorn :  "  And  have  you  too  turned  coward  ?  " 

The  taunt  stung.  Its  victim  flashed,  but  in  the 
next  breath  her  smile  was  clemency  itself  as  she  drew 
Victorine  from  him  and  shot  her  neat  reply,  well  know 
ing  he  would  never  guess  the  motives  behind  it — the 
bow  whence  flew  the  shaft:  the  revenge  she  owed  the 
cause  that  had  burned  their  home;  her  malice  against 
Anna;  the  agony  of  losing  him  they  now  called  dead 
and  buried;  the  new,  acute  loathing  that  issued  from 
that  agony  upon  the  dismal  Irby;  her  baffled  hunger 
for  the  jewels;  her  plans  for  the  chest  of  plate;  hopes 
vanishing  in  smoke  with  yonder  burning  ship;  thought 
of  Greenleaf's  probable  return  with  the  blue  army, 
of  the  riddles  that  return  might  make,  and  of  the  ruin,  the 
burning  and  sinking  riot  and  ruin,  these  things  were 
making  in  her  own  soul  as  if  it,  too,  were  a  city  lost. 

" Charlie,"  she  said,  "you  'ave  yo'  fight.  Me,  I 
'ave  mine.  Here  is  grandma.  Ask  her — if  my  fight 
— of  every  day — for  you  and  her — and  not  yet  finish* 
— would  not  eat  the  last  red  speck  of  courage  out  of 
yo'  blood." 

She  turned  to  Victorine:  "Oh,  he's  brave!  He  'as 
all  that  courage  to  go,  in  that  condition!  Well,  we 
three  women,  we  'ave  the  courage  to  let  him  go  and 
ourselve'  to  stay.  But — Charlie!  take  with  you  the 
Callender'!  Yes!  You,  you  can  protec'  them,  same 

266 


Anna  Amazes  Herself 

time  they  can  take  care  of  you.  Stop! — Grandma!— 
yo'  bonnet  and  gaiter'!  All  three,  Victorine,  we  will 
help  them,  all  four,  get  away!" 

On  the  road  to  Callender  House,  while  Charlie  and 
Victorine  palavered  together — "I  cannot  quite  make 
out,"  minced  the  French-speaking  grandmother  to 
Flora,  "the  real  reason  why  you  are  doing  this." 

"'T  is  with  me  the  same!"  eagerly  responded  the 
beauty,  in  the  English  she  preferred.  *'I  thing  maybe 
*t  is  juz  inspiration.  What  you  thing?" 

"I ?  I  am  afraid  it  is  only  your  great  love  for  Anna 
— making  you  a  trifle  blind." 

The  eyes  of  each  rested  in  the  other's  after  the 
manner  we  know  and  the  thought  passed  between 
them,  that  if  further  news  was  yet  to  come  of  the  lost 
artillerist,  any  soul-reviving  news,  it  would  almost 
certainly  come  first  to  New  Orleans  and  from  the 
men  in  blue. 

"No,"  chanted  the  granddaughter,  "I  can't  tell 
what  is  making  me  do  that  unlezz  my  guardian  angel!" 


ANNA  AMAZES  HERSELF 

ONCE  more  the  Carroilton  Gardens. 

Again  the  afternoon  hour,  the  white  shell-paved 
court,  its  two  playing  fountains,  the  roses,  lilies,  jas 
mines  and  violets,,  their  perfume  spicing  all  the  air, 
and  the  oriole  and  mocking-bird  enrapturing  it  with 
their  songs,  although  it  was  that  same  dire  twenty- 
fourth  of  April  of  which  we  have  been  telling.  Town- 

267 


Kincaid's  Battery 

ward  across  the  wide  plain  the  distant  smoke  of  suicidal 
conflagration  studded  the  whole  great  double  crescent 
of  the  harbor.  Again  the  slim  railway,  its  frequent 
small  trains  from  the  city  clanging  round  the  flowery 
miles  of  its  half-circle,  again  the  highway  on  either 
side  the  track,  and  again  on  the  highway,  just  reach 
ing  the  gardens,  whose  dashing  coach  and  span,  but 
the  Callenders'? 

Dashing  was  the  look  of  it,  not  its  speed.  Sedately  it 
came.  Behind  it  followed  a  team  of  four  giant  mules, 
a  joy  to  any  quartermaster's  vision,  drawing  a  planta 
tion  wagon  rilled  with  luggage.  On  the  old  coach 
man's  box  sat  beside  him  a  slave  maid,  and  in  the 
carriage  the  three  Callenders  and  Charlie.  Anna  and 
Miranda  were  on  the  rear  seat  and  for  the  wounded  boy's 
better  ease  his  six-shooter  lay  in  Anna's  lap.  A  brave 
animation  in  the  ladies  was  only  the  more  prettily  set 
off  by  a  pinkness  of  earlier  dejection  about  their  eyes. 
Abreast  the  gate  they  halted  to  ask  an  armed  sentry 
whether  the  open  way  up  the  river  coast  was  through 
the  gardens  or 

He  said  there  was  no  longer  any  open  way  without 
a  pass  from  General  Lovell,  and  when  they  affably 
commended  the  precaution  and  showed  a  pass  he 
handed  it  to  an  officer,  a  heated,  bustling,  road-soiled 
young  Creole,  who  had  ridden  up  at  the  head  of  a 
mounted  detail.  This  youth,  as  he  read  it,  shrugged. 
"Under  those  present  condition*,"  he  said,  with  a  wide 
gesture  toward  the  remote  miles  of  blazing  harbor, 
"he  could  not  honor  a  pazz  two  weeks  ole.  They 
would  'ave  to  rit-urn  and  get  it  renew'." 

"  Oh !  how  ?  How  hope  to  do  so  in  all  yonder  chaos  ? 
268 


Anna  Amazes  Herself 

And  how!  oh,  how!  could  an  army — in  full  retreat — 
leaving  women  and  wounded  soldiers  to  the  mercy  of 
a  ravening  foe — compel  them  to  remain  in  the  city  it 
was  itself  evacuating?"  A  sweet  and  melodious 
dignity  was  in  all  the  questions,  but  eyes  shone,  brows 
arched,  lips  hung  apart  and  bonnet-feathers  and  hat- 
feathers,  capes  and  flounces,  seemed  to  ruffle  wider, 
with  consternation  and  hurt  esteem. 

The  officer  could  not  explain  a  single  how.  He 
could  do  no  more  than  stubbornly  regret  that  the  ques 
tioners  must  even  return  by  train,  the  dread  exigencies 
of  the  hour  compelling  him  to  impress  these  horses  for 
one  of  his  guns  and  those  mules  for  his  battery-wagon. 

Anna's  three  companions  would  have  sprung  to 
their  feet  but  in  some  way  her  extended  hand  stayed 
them.  A  year  earlier  Charlie  would  have  made  sad 
mistakes  here,  but  now  he  knew  the  private  soldier's 
helplessness  before  the  gold  bars  of  commission,  and 
his  rage  was  white  and  dumb,  as,  with  bursting  eyes, 
he  watched  the  officer  pencil  a  blank. 

"Don't  write  that,  sir,"  said  a  clear  voice,  and  the 
writer,  glancing  up,  saw  Anna  standing  among  the 
seated  three.  Her  face  was  drawn  with  distress  and 
as  pale  as  Charlie's,  but  Charlie's  revolver  was  in  her 
hand,  close  to  her  shoulder,  pointed  straight  upward  at 
full  cock,  and  the  hand  was  steady.  "  Those  mules 
first,"  she  spoke  on,  "and  then  we,  sir,  are  going  to 
turn  round  and  go  home.  Whatever  our  country  needs 
of  us  we  will  give,  not  sell;  but  we  will  not,  in  her 
name,  be  robbed  on  the  highway,  sir,  and  I  will  put  a 
ball  through  the  head  of  the  first  horse  or  mule  you 
lay  a  hand  on.  Isaac,  turn  your  team." 

269 


Kincaid's  Battery 

Unhindered,  the  teamster,  and  then  the  coachman, 
turned  and  drove.  Back  toward,  and  by  and  by,  into 
the  vast  woe-stricken  town  they  returned  in  the 
scented  airs  and  athwart  the  long  shadows  of  that  same 
declining  sun  which  fourteen  years  before — or  was  it 
actually  but  fourteen  months? — had  first  gilded  the 
splendid  maneuverings  of  Kincaid's  Battery.  The 
tragi-comic  rencounter  just  ended  had  left  the  three 
ladies  limp,  gay,  and  tremulous,  with  Anna  aghast 
at  herself  and  really  wondering  between  spells  of  shame 
and  fits  of  laughter  what  had  happened  to  her  reason. 

With  his  pistol  buckled  on  again,  Charlie  had  only 
a  wordy  wrath  for  the  vanished  officer,  and  grim  wor 
ship  of  Anna,  while  Constance  and  Miranda,  behind 
a  veil  of  mirthful  recapitulations,  tenderly  rejoiced  in 
the  relief  of  mind  and  heart  which  the  moment  had 
brought  to  her  who  had  made  it  amazing.  And  now 
the  conditions  around  them  in  streets,  homes,  and  marts 
awoke  sympathies  in  all  the  four,  which  further  eased 
their  own  distresses. 

The  universal  delirium  of  fright  and  horror  had 
passed.  Through  all  the  city's  fevered  length  and 
breadth,  in  the  belief  that  the  victorious  ships,  repairing 
the  lacerations  of  battle  as  they  came,  were  coming  so 
slowly  that  they  could  not  arrive  for  a  day  or  two,  and 
that  they  were  bringing  no  land  forces  with  them,  thou 
sands  had  become  rationally,  desperately  busy  for  flight. 
Everywhere  hacks,  private  carriages,  cabs,  wagons, 
light  and  heavy,  and  carts,  frail  or  strong,  carts  for 
bread  or  meat,  for  bricks  or  milk,  were  bearing  fugi 
tives — old  men,  young  mothers,  grandmothers,  maidens 
and  children — with  their  trunks,  bales,  bundles,  slaves 

270 


Anna  Amazes  Herself 

and  provisions — toward  the  Jackson  Railroad  to  board 
the  first  non-military  train  they  could  squeeze  into, 
and  toward  the  New  and  Old  Basins  to  sleep  on 
schooner  decks  under  the  open  stars  in  the  all-night 
din  of  building  deckhouses.  Many  of  them  were 
familiar  acquaintances  and  chirruped  good-by  to  the 
Callenders.  Passes?  No  trouble  whatever!  Charlie 
need  only  do  this  and  that  and  so  and  so,  and  there 
you  were! 

But  Charlie  was  by  this  time  so  nervously  spent 
and  in  such  pain  that  the  first  thing  must  be  to  get 
him  into  bed  again — at  Callender  House,  since  noth 
ing  could  induce  him  to  let  sister,  sweetheart  or  grand 
mother  know  he  had  not  got  away.  To  hurt  his  pride 
the  more,  in  every  direction  military  squads  with  bay 
onets  fixed  were  smartly  fussing  from  one  small  domi 
cile  to  another,  hustling  out  the  laggards  and  march 
ing  them  to  encampments  on  the  public  squares. 
Other  squads — of  the  Foreign  Legion,  appointed  to 
remain  behind  in  "armed  neutrality" — patroled  the 
sidewalks  strenuously,  preserving  order  with  a  high 
hand.  Down  this  street  drums  roared,  fifes  squealed 
and  here  passed  yet  another  stately  regiment  on  toward 
and  now  into  and  down,  Calliope  Street,  silent  as  the 
rabble  it  marched  through,  to  take  train  for  Camp 
Moore  in  the  Mississippi  hills. 

"Good  Lord!"  gasped  Charlie,  "if  that  isn't  the 
Confederate  Guards!  Oh,  what  good  under  heaven 
can  those  old  chaps  do  at  the  front?" — the  very  thing 
the  old  chaps  were  asking  themselves. 


271 


Kincaid's  Battery 

LI 

THE  CALLENDER  HORSES  ENLIST 

MERE  mind  should  ever  be  a  most  reverent  servant 
to  the  soul.  But  in  fact,  and  particularly  in  hours 
stately  with  momentous  things,  what  a  sacrilegious 
trick  it  has  of  nagging  its  holy  mistress  with  triflet 
light  as  air — small  as  gnats  yet  as  pertinacious. 

To  this  effect,  though  written  with  a  daintier  pen, 
were  certain  lines  but  a  few  hours  old,  that  twenty- 
fourth  of  April,  in  a  diary  which  through  many  months 
had  received  many  entries  since  the  one  that  has  already 
told  us  of  its  writer  paired  at  Doctor  Sevier's  dinner 
party  with  a  guest  now  missing,  and  of  her  hearing, 
in  the  starlight  with  that  guest,  the  newsboys'  cry  that 
his  and  her  own  city's  own  Beauregard  had  opened  fire 
on  Fort  Sumter  and  begun  this  war — which  now  behold  1 

Of  this  droll  impishness  of  the  mind,  even  in  this 
carriage  to-day,  with  these  animated  companions,  and 
in  all  this  tribulation,  ruin,  and  flight,  here  was  a  harry 
ing  instance:  that  every  minute  or  twt>,  whatever  the 
soul's  outer  preoccupation  or  inner  anguish,  there 
would,  would,  would  return,  return  and  return  the 
doggerel  words  and  swaggering  old  tune  of  that  song 
abhorred  by  the  gruff  General,  but  which  had  first 
awakened  the  love  of  so  many  hundreds  of  brave  men 
for  its  brave,  gay  singer  now  counted  forever  lost: 

"Ole  mahs'  love'  wine,  ole  mis'  love'  silk " 

Generally  she  could  stop  it  there,  but  at  times  it 
contrived  to  steal  unobserved  through  the  second  line 

272 


The  Callender  Horses  Enlist 

and  then  no  power  could  keep  it  from  marching  on  to 
the  citadel,  the  end  of  the  refrain.  Base,  antic  awak- 
ener  of  her  heart's  dumb  cry  of  infinite  loss!  For 
every  time  the  tormenting  inanity  won  its  way,  that 
other  note,  that  unvoiced  agony,  hurled  itself  against 
the  bars  of  its  throbbing  prison. 

"Ole  mahs'  love'  wine,  ole  mis'  love' " 

"Oh,  Hilary,  my  Hilary!" 

From  the  Creole  Quarter  both  carriage  and  wagon 
turned  to  the  water  front.  Charlie's  warning  that  even 
more  trying  scenes  would  be  found  there  was  in  vain. 
Anna  insisted,  the  fevered  youth's  own  evident  wish 
was  to  see  the  worst,  and  Constance  and  Miranda, 
dutifully  mirthful,  reminded  him  that  through  Anna 
they  also  had  now  tasted  blood.  As  the  equipage 
came  out  upon  the  Levee  and  paused  to  choose  a  way, 
the  sisters  sprang  up  and  gazed  abroad,  sustaining 
each  other  by  their  twined  arms. 

To  right,  to  left,  near  and  far — only  not  just  here 
where  the  Coast  steamboats  landed — the  panorama 
was  appalling.  All  day  Anna  had  hungered  for  some 
incident  or  spectacle  whose  majesty  or  terror  would 
suffice  to  distract  her  from  her  own  desolation;  but 
here  it  was  made  plain  to  her  that  a  distress  before 
which  hand  and  speech  are  helpless  only  drives  the 
soul  in  upon  its  own  supreme  devotion  and  woe.  One 
wide  look  over  those  far  flat  expanses  of  smoke  and 
flame  answered  the  wonder  of  many  hours,  as  to  where 
all  the  drays  and  floats  of  the  town  had  gone  and 
what  they  could  be  doing.  Along  the  entire  sinuous 
riverside  the  whole  great  blockaded  seaport's  choked-in 

273 


Kincaid's  Battery 

stores  of  tobacco  and  cotton,  thousands  of  hogsheads, 
ten  thousands  of  bales — lest  they  enrich  the  enemy — 
were  being  hauled  to  the  wharves  and  landings  and 
were  just  now  beginning  to  receive  the  torch,  the  wharves 
also  burning,  and  boats  and  ships  on  either  side  of 
the  river  being  fired  and  turned  adrift. 

Yet  all  the  more  because  of  the  scene,  a  scene  that 
quelled  even  the  haunting  strain  of  song,  that  other  note, 
that  wail  which,  the  long  day  through,  had  writhed 
unreleased  in  her  bosom,  rose,  silent  still,  yet  only  the 
stronger  and  more  importunate 

"Oh,  Hilary,  my  soldier,  my  flag's,  my  country's 
defender,  come  back  to  me — here! — now! — my  yet  liv 
ing  hero,  my  Hilary  Kincaid!" 

Reluctantly,  she  let  Constance  draw  her  down,  and 
presently,  in  a  voice  rich  with  loyal  pride,  as  the  carriage 
moved  on,  bade  Charlie  and  Miranda  observe  that  only 
things  made  contraband  by  the  Richmond  Congress 
were  burning,  while  all  the  Coast  Landing's  wealth 
of  Louisiana  foodstuffs,  in  barrels  and  hogsheads, 
bags  and  tierces,  lay  unharmed.  Yet  not  long  could 
their  course  hold  that  way,  and 


"Ole      mahs'      love'      wine,       ole  — " 

it  was  Anna  who  first  proposed  retreat.  The  very 
havoc  was  fascinating  and  the  courage  of  Constance 
and  Miranda,  though  stripped  of  its  mirth,  remained 
undaunted;  but  the  eye-torture  of  the  cotton  smoke 
was  enough  alone  to  drive  them  back  to  the  inner 
streets. 

274 


.The  Callender  Horses  Enlist 

Here  the  direction  of  their  caravan,  away  from  all 
avenues  of  escape,  no  less  than  their  fair  faces,  drew 
the  notice  of  every  one,  while  to  the  four  themselves 
every  busy  vehicle — where  none  was  idle, — every 
sound  remote  or  near,  every  dog  in  search  of  his  master, 
and  every  man — how  few  the  men  had  become! — 
every  man,  woman  or  child,  alone  or  companioned, 
overladen  or  empty-handed,  hurrying  out  of  gates  or 
into  doors,  standing  to  stare  or  pressing  intently  or 
distractedly  on,  calling,  jesting,  scolding  or  weeping — 
and  how  many  wept! — bore  a  new,  strange  interest  of 
fellowship.  So  Callender  House  came  again  to  view, 
oh,  how  freshly,  dearly,  appealingly  beautiful!  As 
the  Callender  train  drew  into  its  gate  and  grove,  the  car 
riage  was  surrounded,  before  it  could  reach  the  veranda 
steps,  by  a  full  dozen  of  household  slaves,  male  and 
female,  grown,  half-grown,  clad  and  half-clad,  some 
grinning,  some  tittering,  all  overjoyed,  yet  some  in 
tears.  There  had  been  no  such  gathering  at  the  de 
parture.  To  spare  the  feelings  of  the  mistresses  the 
dominating  "mammy"  of  the  kitchen  had  forbidden 
it.  But  now  that  they  were  back,  Glory!  Hallelujah! 

"And  had  it  really,"  the  three  home-returning  fair 
ones  asked,  "seemed  so  desolate  and  deadly  perilous 
just  for  want  of  them?  What! — had  seemed  so  even 
to  stalwart  Tom? — and  Scipio? — and  Habakkuk? 
And  were  Hettie  and  Dilsie  actually  so  in  terror  of  the 
Yankees?" 

"Oh,  if  we'd  known  that  we'd  never  have  started!" 
exclaimed  Constance,  with  tears,  which  she  stoutly 
quenched,  while  from  all  around  came  sighs  and 
moans  of  love  and  gratitude. 

275 


Kincaid's  Battery 

And  were  the  three  verily  back  to  stay  ? 

Ah!  that  was  the  question.  While  Charlie,  well  at 
tended,  went  on  up  and  in  they  paused  on  the  wide 
stair  and  in  mingled  distress  and  drollery  asked  each 
other,  "Are  we  back  to  stay,  or  not?" 

A  new  stir  among  the  domestics  turned  their  eyes 
down  into  the  garden.  Beyond  the  lingering  vehicles 
a  lieutenant  from  Camp  Callender  rode  up  the  drive. 
Two  or  three  private  soldiers  hung  back  at  the  gate. 

"It's  horses  and  mules  again,  Nan,"  gravely  re 
marked  Constance,  and  the  three,  facing  toward  him, 
with  Miranda  foremost,  held  soft  debate.  Whether 
the  decision  they  reached  was  to  submit  or  resist,  the 
wide  ears  of  the  servants  could  not  be  sure,  but  by  the 
time  the  soldier  was  dismounting  the  ladies  had  sum 
moned  the  nerve  to  jest. 

"Be  a  man,  Miranda!"  murmured  Constance. 

"But  not  the  kind  I  was!"  prompted  Anna. 

"No,"  said  her  sister,  "for  this  one  coming  is  al 
ready  scared  to  death." 

"So's  Miranda,"  breathed  Anna  as  he  came  up  the 
steps  uncovering  and  plainly  uncomfortable.  A  pang 
lanced  through  her  as  she  caught  herself  senselessly 
recalling  the  flag  presentation.  And  then 


"—oh!  oh!" 

"Mrs.  Callender?"  asked  the  stranger. 
"Yes,  sir,"  said  that  lady. 

"My  business" — he  glanced  back  in  nervous  protest 
276 


The  Callender  Horses  Enlist 

as  the  drivers  beneath  gathered  their  reins — "will  you 
kindly  detain ?" 

"If  you  wish,  sir,"  she  replied,  visibly  trembling. 
"Isaac " 

From  the  rear  of  the  group  came  the  voice  of  Anna: 
"Miranda,  dear,  I  wouldn't  stop  them."  The  men 
regathered  the  lines.  She  moved  half  a  step  down  and 
stayed  herself  on  her  sister's  shoulder.  Miranda 
wrinkled  back  at  her  in  an  ecstasy  of  relief: 

"Oh,  Anna,  do  speak  for  all  of  us!" 

The  teams  started  away.  A  distress  came  into  the 
soldier's  face,  but  Anna  met  it  with  a  sober  smile: 
"Don't  be  troubled,  sir,  you  shall  have  them.  Drive 
round  into  the  basement,  Ben,  and  unload."  The 
drivers  went.  "You  shall  have  them,  sir,  on  your 
simple  word  of  honor  as " 

"Of  course  you  will  be  reimbursed.     I  pledge " 

"No,  sir,"  tearfully  put  in  Constance,  "we've  given 
our  men,  we  can't  sell  our  beasts." 

"They  are  not  ours  to  sell,"  said  Anna. 

"Why,  Nan!" 

"They  belong  to  Kincaid's  Battery,"  said  Anna, 
and  Constance,  Miranda,  and  the  servants  smiled  a 
proud  approval.  Even  the  officer  flushed  with  a  fine 
ardor: 

"You  have  with  you  a  member  of  that  com 
mand?" 

"We  have." 

"Then,  on  my  honor  as  a  Southern  soldier,  if  he 
will  stay  by  them  and  us  as  far  as  Camp  Moore,  to 
Kincaid's  Battery  they  shall  go.  But,  ladies " 

"Yes,"  knowingly  spoke  Miranda.  "Hettie,  Scipio, 
277 


KincaicTs  Battery 

Dilsie,  you-all  can  go  'long  back  to  your  work  now." 
She  wrinkled  confidentially  to  the  officer. 

"Yes,"  he  replied,  "we  shall  certainly  engage  the 
enemy's  ships  to-morrow,  and  you  ladies  must " 

"Must  not  desert  our  home,  sir,"  said  Anna. 

"Nor  our  faithful  servants,"  added  the  other  two. 

"Ah,  ladies,  but  if  we  should  have  to  make  this 
house  a  field  hospital,  with  all  the  dreadful " 

"Oh,  that  settles  it,"  cried  the  three,  "we  stay!" 


LIT 

HERE   THEY   COME! 

WHAT  a  night!  Yet  the  great  city  slept.  Like  its 
soldiers  at  their  bivouac  fires  it  lay  and  slumbered 
beside  its  burning  harbor.  Sleep  was  duty. 

Callender  House  kept  no  vigil.  Lighted  by  the  far 
devastation,  its  roof  shone  gray,  its  cornice  white,  its 
tree-tops  green  above  the  darkness  of  grove  and  garden. 
From  its  upper  windows  you  might  have  seen  the  town- 
ward  bends  of  the  river  gleam  red,  yellow,  and  bronze, 
or  the  luminous  smoke  of  destruction  (slantingly  over 
its  flood  and  farther  shore)  roll,  thin  out,  and  vanish 
in  a  moonless  sky.  But  from  those  windows  no  one 
looked  forth.  After  the  long,  strenuous,  open-air  day, 
sleep,  even  to  Anna,  had  come  swiftly. 

Waking  late  and  springing  to  her  elbow  she  pres 
ently  knew  that  every  one  else  was  up  and  about.  Her 
maid  came  and  she  hastened  to  dress.  Were  the 
hostile  ships  in  sight?  Not  yet.  Wa£  the  city  still 
undestroyed?  Yes,  though  the  cotton  brought  out 

278 


Here  They  Come ! 

to  the  harbor-side  was  now  fifteen  thousand  bales 
and  with  its  blazing  made  a  show  as  if  all  the  town 
were  afire.  She  was  furiously  hungry;  was  not  break 
fast  ready?  Yes,  Constance  and  Miranda — "done 
had  breakfuss  and  gone  oveh  to  de  cottage  fo'  to  fix  it 
up  fo'  de  surgeon  .  .  .  No,  'm,  not  dis  house;  he  done 
change'  his  mine."  Carriage  horses — mules?  "Yass, 
'm,  done  gone.  Mahs'  Chahlie  gone  wid  'm.  He 
gone  to  be  boss  o'  de  big  gun  what  show'  f'om  dese 
windehs."  Oh,  but  that  was  an  awful  risk,  wounded 
as  he  was !  "  Yass,  'm,  but  he  make  his  promise  to  Miss 
Flo'a  he  won't  tech  de  gun  hisseff."  What!  Miss 
Flora — ?  "Oh,  she  be'n,  but  she  gone  ag'in.  Law'! 
she  a  brave  un!  It  e'en  a'most  make  me  brave,  dess 
to  see  de  high  sperits  she  in!"  The  narrator  de 
parted. 

How  incredible  was  the  hour.  Looking  out  on  the 
soft  gray  sky  and  river  and  down  into  the  camp,  that 
still  kept  such  quiet  show  of  routine,  or  passing  down 
the  broad  hall  stair,  through  the  library  and  into  the 
flowery  breakfast  room,  how  keenly  real  everything 
that  met  the  eye,  how  unreal  whatever  was  beyond 
sight.  How  vividly  actual  this  lovely  home  in  the 
sweet  ease  and  kind  grace  of  its  lines  and  adornments. 
How  hard  to  move  with  reference  to  things  unseen, 
when  heart  and  mind  and  all  power  of  realizing  un 
seen  things  were  far  away  in  the  ravaged  fields,  mangled 
roads  and  haunted  woods  and  ravines  between  Corinth 
and  Shiloh/ 

But  out  in  the  garden,  so  fair  and  odorous  as  one 
glided  through  it  to  the  Mandeville  cottage,  things 
boldly  in  view  made  sight  itself  hard  to  believe.  Was 

279 


Kincaid's  Battery 

that  bespattered  gray  horseman  no  phantom,  who 
came  galloping  up  the  river  road  and  called  to  a  ser 
vant  at  the  gate  that  the  enemy's  fleet  was  in  sight 
from  English  Turn?  Was  that  truly  New  Orleans, 
back  yonder,  wrapped  in  smoke,  like  fallen  Carthage 
or  Jerusalem?  Or  here!  this  black-and-crimson  thing 
drifting  round  the  bend  in  mid-current  and  without  a 
sign  of  life  aboard  or  about  it,  was  this  not  a  toy  or 
sham,  but  one  more  veritable  ship  in  veritable  flames? 
And  beyond  and  following  it,  helpless  as  a  drift-log, 
was  that  lifeless  white-and-crimson  thing  a  burning  pas 
senger  steamer — and  that  behind  it  another  ?  Here  in 
the  cottage,  plainly  these  were  Constance  and  Miranda, 
and,  on  second  view,  verily  here  were  a  surgeon  and 
his  attendants.  But  were  these  startling  preparations 
neither  child's  play  nor  dream? 

Child's  play  persistently  seemed,  at  any  rate,  the 
small  bit  of  yellow  stuff  produced  as  a  hospital  flag. 
Oh,  surely!  would  not  a  much  larger  be  far  safer? 
It  would.  Well,  at  the  house  there  was  some  yellow 
curtaining  packed  in  one  of  the  boxes,  Isaac  could  tell 
which 

"I  think  I  know  right  where  it  is!"  said  Anna,  and 
hurried  away  to  find  and  send  it.  The  others,  widow 
and  wife,  would  stay  where  they  were  and  Anna  would 
take  command  at  the  big  house,  where  the  domestics 
would  soon  need  to  be  emboldened,  cheered,  calmed, 
controlled.  Time  flies  when  opening  boxes  that  have 
been  stoutly  nailed  and  hooped  over  the  nails.  When  the 
goods  proved  not  to  be  in  the  one  where  Anna  "knew" 
they  were  she  remembered  better,  of  course,  and  in 
the  second  they  were  found.  Just  as  the  stuff  had  been 

280 


Here  They  Come ! 

drawn  forth  and  was  being  hurried  away  by  the  hand 
of  Dilsie,  a  sergeant  and  private  from  the  camp,  one 
with  a  field  glass,  the  other  with  a  signal  flag,  came 
asking  leave  to  use  them  from  the  belvedere  on  the 
roof.  Anna  led  them  up  to  it. 

How  suddenly  authentic  became  everything,  up  here. 
Flat  as  a  map  lay  river,  city,  and  plain.  Almost  under 
them  and  amusingly  clear  in  detail,  they  looked  down 
into  Camp  Callender  and  the  Chalmette  fortifications. 
When  they  wigwagged,  "Nothing  in  sight,"  to  what 
seemed  a  very  real  toy  soldier  with  a  very  real  toy 
flag,  on  a  green  toy  mound  in  the  midst  of  the  work 
(the  magazine),  he  wigwagged  in  reply,  and  across 
the  river  a  mere  speck  of  real  humanity  did  the  same 
from  a  barely  definable  parapet. 

With  her  maid  beside  her  Anna  lingered  a  bit.  She 
loved  to  be  as  near  any  of  the  dear  South's  defenders 
as  modesty  would  allow,  but  these  two  had  once  been 
in  Kincaid's  Battery,  her  Hilary's  own  boys.  As 
lookouts  they  were  not  yet  skilled.  In  this  familiar 
scene  she  knew  things  by  the  eye  alone,  which  the 
sergeant,  unused  even  to  his  glass,  could  hardly  be 
sure  of  through  it. 

Her  maid  looked  up  and  around.  "Gwine  to  rain 
ag'in,"  she  murmured,  and  the  mistress  assented  with 
her  gaze  in  the  southeast.  In  this  humid  air  and  level 
country  a  waterside  row  of  live-oaks  hardly  four  miles 
off  seemed  at  the  world's  edge  and  hid  all  the  river 
beyond  it. 

"There's  where  the  tips  of  masts  always  show  first," 
she  ventured  to  the  sergeant.  "We  can't  expect  any 
but  the  one  kind  now,  can  we  ?" 

281 


Kincaid's  Battery 

"'Fraid  not,  moving  up-stream." 

"Then  yonder  they  come.  See?  two  or  three  tiny, 
needle-like — h-m-m! — just  over  that  farth' ?" 

He  lowered  the  glass  and  saw  better  without  it. 

The  maid  burst  out:  "Oh,  Lawd,  /  does!  Oh,  good 
Gawd  A'mighty!"  She  sprang  to  descend,  but  with  a 
show  of  wonder  Anna  spoke  and  she  halted. 

"If  you  want  to  leave  me,"  continued  the  mistress, 
"you  need  only  ask." 

"Law',  Miss  Nannie!    Me  leave  you?    I " 

"If  you  do — now — to-day — for  one  minute,  I'll 
never  take  you  back.  I'll  have  Hettie  or  Dilsie." 

"Missie," — tears  shone — "d'  ain't  nothin'  in  Gawd's 
worl'  kin  eveh  make  me  a  runaway  niggeh  f'om  you! 
But  ef  you  tell  me  now  fo'  to  go  fetch  ev'y  dahky  we 
owns  up  to  you " 

"Yes!  on  the   upper  front  veranda!     Go,  do  it!" 

"Yass,  Jm!  'caze  ef  us  kin  keep  'em  anywahs  it'll 
be  in  de  bes'  place  fo'  to  see  de  mos'  sights!"  She 
vanished  and  Anna  turned  to  the  soldiers.  Their 
flagging  had  paused  while  they  watched  the  far-away 
top-gallants  grow  in  height  and  numbers.  Down  in  the 
works  the  long-roll  was  sounding  and  from  every 
direction  men  were  answering  it  at  a  run.  Across  the 
river  came  bugle  notes.  Sighingly  the  sergeant  low 
ered  his  glass: 

"Lordy,  it's  the  whole  kit  and  b'ilinM  Wag,  John. 
When  they  swing  up  round  this  end  of  the  trees  I'll 
count  'em.  Here  they  come!  One,  .  .  .  two,  .  .  . 
why,  what  small — oh,  see  this  big  fellow!  Look  at 
the  width  of  those  yards!  And  look  at  all  their  hulls, 
painted  the  color  of  the  river!  And  see  that  pink 

282 


Here  They  Come ! 

flutter — look!"  he  said  to  Anna,  "do  you  get  it?  high 
up  among  the  black  ropes?  that  pink " 

"Yes,"  said  Anna  solemnly,  "I  see  it " 

"That's  the  old " 

"Yes.     Must  we  fire  on  that?  and  fire  first?" 

"We'd  better!"  laughed  the  soldier,  "if  we  fire 
at  all.  Those  chaps  have  got  their  answer  ready  and 
there  won't  be  much  to  say  after  it."  The  three  hur 
ried  down,  the  men  to  camp,  Anna  to  the  upper  front 
veranda.  There,  save  two  or  three  with  Constance 
and  Miranda,  came  all  the  servants,  shepherded  by 
Isaac  and  Ben  with  vigilant  eyes  and  smothered  vows  to 
"kill  de  fuss  he  aw  she  niggeh  dat  try  to  skedaddle"; 
came  and  stood  to  gaze  with  her  over  and  between 
the  grove  trees.  Down  in  the  fortification  every  man 
seemed  to  have  sprung  to  his  post.  On  its  outer  crest, 
with  his  adjutant,  stood  the  gilded  commander  peer 
ing  through  his  glass. 

"Missie,"  sighed  Anna's  maid,  "see  Mahs'  Chahlie 
dah?  stan'in'  on  de  woodworks  o'  dat  big  gun?" 

"Yes,"  said  Anna  carelessly,  but  mutely  praying 
that  some  one  would  make  him  get  down.  Her  brain 
teemed  with  speculations:  Where,  how  occupied  and 
in  what  state  of  things,  what  frame  of  mind,  was  Victor- 
ine,  were  Flora  and  Madame  ?  Here  at  Steve's  cottage 
with  what  details  were  'Randa  and  Connie  busy? 
But  except  when  she  smiled  round  on  the  slaves,  her 
gaze,  like  theirs,  abode  on  the  river  and  the  shore  de 
fenses,  from  whose  high  staffs  floated  brightly  the 
Confederate  flag.  How  many  a  time  in  this  last  fear 
ful  year  had  her  own  Hilary,  her  somewhere  still  liv 
ing,  laughing,  loving  Hilary,  stood  like  yon  commander, 

283 


Kincaid's  Battery 

about  to  deal  havoc  from,  and  to  draw  it  upon,  Kin- 
caid's  Battery.  Who  would  say  that  even  now  he 
might  not  be  so  standing,  with  her  in  every  throb  of 
his  invincible  heart? 

Something  out  in  the  view  disturbed  the  servants. 

"Oh,  Lawd  'a'  massy!"  moaned  a  woman. 

"Trus'  Him,  Aun'  Jinnie!"  prompted  Anna's  maid. 
"Y'  always  is  trus'  Him!" 

"Whoeveh  don't  trus'  Him,  I'll  bus'  him!"  con 
fidentially  growled  Isaac  to  those  around  him. 

"We  all  of  us  must  and  will!"  said  Anna  elatedly, 
though  with  shameful  inward  sinkings  and  with  no 
sustaining  word  from  any  of  the  flock,  while  out  under 
the  far  gray  sky,  emerging  from  a  slight  angle  of  the 
shore  well  down  the  water's  long  reach  the  battle  line 
began  to  issue,  each  ship  in  its  turn  debouching  into 
full  relief  from  main-truck  to  water-line. 


LIII 

SHIPS,    SHELLS,    AND   LETTERS 

STRANGE!  how  little  sense  of  calamity  came  with 
them — at  first.  So  graceful  they  were.  So  fitted — 
like  waterfowl — to  every  mood  of  air  and  tide;  their 
wings  all  furled,  their  neat  bodies  breasting  the  angry 
flood  by  the  quiet  power  of  their  own  steam  and  silent 
submerged  wheels.  So  like  to  the  numberless  crafts 
which  in  kinder  days,  under  friendly  tow,  had  come 
up  this  same  green  and  tawny  reach  and  passed  on  to 
the  queenly  city,  laden  with  gifts,  on  the  peaceful  em 
bassies  of  the  world. 

284 


Ships,  Shells,  and  Letters 

But,  ah!  how  swiftly,  threateningly  they  grew:  the 
smaller,  two-masted  fore-and-afts,  each  seemingly 
unarmed  but  for  one  monster  gun  pivoted  amidships, 
and  the  towering,  wide-armed  three-masters,  the  low 
and  the  tall  consorting  like  dog  and  hunter.  Now,  as 
they  came  on,  a  nice  eye  could  make  out,  down  on  their 
hulls,  light  patches  of  new  repair  where  our  sunken 
fleet  had  so  lately  shot  and  rammed  them,  and,  hang 
ing  over  the  middle  of  each  ship's  side  in  a  broad,  dark 
square  to  protect  her  vitals,  a  mass  of  anchor  chains. 
Their  boarding-netting,  too,  one  saw,  drawn  high  round 
all  their  sides,  and  now  more  guns — and  more! — 
and  more!  the  huger  frowning  over  the  bulwarks, 
the  lesser  in  unbroken  rows,  scowling  each  from  its 
own  port-hole,  while  every  masthead  revealed  itself  a 
little  fort  bristling  with  arms  and  men.  Yes,  and 
there,  high  in  the  clouds  of  rigging,  no  longer  a 
vague  pink  flutter  now,  but  brightly  red-white-and-blue 
and  smilingly  angry — what  a  strange  home-coming  j 
for  it!  ah,  what  a  strange  home-coming  after  a  scant 
year-and-a-half  of  banishment! — the  flag  of  the  Union,  / 
rippling  from  every  peak. 

"Ain'  dey  neveh  gwine  shoot?"  asked  a  negro 
lad. 

"Not  till  they're  out  of  line  with  us,"  said  Anna 
so  confidently  as  to  draw  a  skeptical  grunt  from  his 
mother,  and  for  better  heart  let  a  tune  float  silently 
in  and  out  on  her  breath: 

"  I  loves  to  be  a  beau  to  de  ladies. 
I  loves  to  shake  a  toe  wid  de  ladies " 

She  felt  her  maid's  touch.     Charlie  was  aiming  his 
285 


Kincaid's  Battery 

great  gun,  and  on  either  side  of  her  Isaac  and  Ben 
were  repeating  their  injunctions.     She  spoke  out: 
"If  they  all  shoot  true  we're  safe  enough  now." 
"  An'  ef  de  ships  don't,"  put  in  Isaac,  "dey'll  mighty 


The  prophecy  was  lost.  All  the  shore  guns  blazed 
and  crashed.  The  white  smoke  belched  and  spread. 
Broken  window-panes  jingled.  Wails  and  moans  from 
the  slave  women  were  silenced  by  imperious  outcries 
from  Isaac  and  Ben.  There  followed  a  mid-air  scream 
and  roar  as  of  fifty  railway  trains  passing  each  other 
on  fifty  bridges,  and  the  next  instant  a  storm  of  the 
enemy's  shells  burst  over  and  in  the  batteries.  But  the 
house  stood  fast  and  half  a  dozen  misquotations  of 
David  and  Paul  were  spouted  from  the  braver  ones  of 
Anna's  flock.  In  a  moment  a  veil  of  smoke  hid  ships 
and  shore,  yet  fearfully  true  persisted  the  enemy's 
aim.  To  home-guards,  rightly  hopeless  of  their  case 
and  never  before  in  action,  every  hostile  shot  was  like 
a  volcano's  eruption,  and  their  own  fire  rapidly  fell  off. 
But  on  the  veranda,  amid  a  weeping,  prattling,  squeal 
ing  and  gesturing  of  women  and  children,  Anna  could 
not  distinguish  the  bursting  of  the  foe's  shells  from  the 
answering  thunder  of  Confederate  guns,  and  when  in 
a  bare  ten  minutes  unarmed  soldiers  began  to  come 
out  of  the  smoke  and  to  hurry  through  the  grove,  while 
riders  of  harnessed  horses  and  mules — harnessed  to 
nothing — lashed  up  the  levee  road  at  full  run,  and 
Isaac  and  Ben  proudly  cried  that  one  was  Mahs'  Chahlie 
and  that  the  animals  were  theirs  of  Callender  House,  she 
still  asked  over  the  balustrade  how  the  fight  had  gone. 

For  reply  despairing  hands  pointed  her  back  toward 
286 


Ships,  Shells,  and  Letters 

the  river,  and  there,  as  she  and  her  groaning  servants 
gazed,  the  great  black  masts  and  yards,  with  head 
way  resumed  and  every  ensign  floating,  loomed  silently 
forth  and  began  to  pass  the  veranda.  Down  in  the 
intervening  garden,  brightly  self-contained  among  the 
pale  stragglers  there,  appeared  the  one-armed  reporter, 
with  a  younger  brother  in  the  weather-worn  gray  and 
red  of  Kincaid's  Battery.  They  waved  a  pocket- 
soiled  letter  and  asked  how  to  get  in  and  up  to  her; 
but  before  she  could  do  more  than  toss  them  a  key 
there  came,  not  from  the  ships  but  from  close  overhead 
under  a  blackening  sky,  one  last,  hideous  roar  and  ear- 
splitting  howl.  The  beautiful  treasure-laden  home 
heaved,  quivered,  lurched  and  settled  again,  the  women 
shrieked  and  crouched  or  fell  prone  with  covered 
heads,  and  a  huge  shell,  sent  by  some  pain-crazed 
fugitive  from  a  gun  across  the  river,  and  which  had 
entered  at  the  roof,  exploded  in  the  basement  with  a 
harrowing  peal  and  filled  every  corner  of  the  dwelling 
with  blinding  smoke  and  stifling  dust. 

Constance  and  Miranda  met  Anna  groping  and 
staggering  out  of  the  chaos.  Unharmed,  herself,  and 
no  one  badly  hurt?  Ah,  hear  the  sudden  wail  of  that 
battery  boy  as  he  finds  his  one-armed  brother!  Anna 
kneels  with  him  over  the  writhing  form  while  women 
fly  for  the  surgeon,  and  men,  at  her  cry,  hasten  to  im 
provise  a  litter.  No  idle  song  haunts  her  now,  yet 
a  clamoring  whisper  times  itself  with  every  pulsation 
of  her  bosom:  "The  letter?  the  letter?" 

Pity  kept  it  from  her  lips,  even  from  her  weeping 
eyes;  yet  somehow  the  fallen  boy  heard,  but  when  he 
tried  to  answer  she  hushed  him.  "Oh,  never  mind 

287 


KincaicTs  Battery 

that,"  she  said,  wiping  away  the  sweat  of  his  agony, 
"it  isn't  important  at  all." 

"Dropped  it,"  he  gasped,  and  had  dropped  it  where 
the  shell  had  buried  it  forever. 

1  Each  for  the  other's  sake  the  lads  rejected  the  hos 
pital,  with  its  risk  of  capture.  The  younger  had  the 
stricken  one  hurried  off  toward  the  railway  and  a 
refugee  mother  in  the  hills,  Constance  tenderly  pro 
testing  until  the  surgeon  murmured  the  truth: 

"  It'll  be  all  one  to  him  by  to-morrow." 

As  the  rearmost  ship  was  passing  the  house  Anna, 
her  comeliness  restored,  half  rose  from  her  bed,  where 
Miranda  stood  trying  to  keep  her.  From  all  the  far 
side  of  the  house  remotely  sounded  the  smart  tramp 
and  shuffle  of  servants  clearing  away  wreckage,  and 
the  din  of  their  makeshift  repairs.  She  was  "all  right 
again$"  she  said  as  she  sat,  but  the  abstraction  of  her 
eyes  and  the  barkening  droop  of  her  head  showed  that 
inwardly  she  still  saw  and  heard  the  death-struck  boy. 

Suddenly  she  stood.  "Dear,  brave  Connie!"  she 
exclaimed,  "we  must  go  help  her,  'Randa."  And  as 
they  went  she  added,  pausing  at  the  head  of  a  stair, 
"Ah,  dear!  if  we,  poor  sinners  all,  could  in  our  dull 
minds  only  multiply  the  awful  numbers  of  war's 
victims  by  the  woes  that  gather  round  any  one  of  them, 
don't  you  think,  'Randa ?" 

Yes,  Miranda  agreed,  certainly  if  man — yes,  and 
woman — had  that  gift  wars  would  soon  be  no  more. 

On  a  high  roof  above  their  apartment  stood  our 
Valcour  ladies.  About  them  babbling  feminine  groups 
looked  down  upon  the  harbor  landings  black  with  male 

288 


Ships,  Shells,  and  Letters 

vagabonds  and  witlings  smashing  the  precious  food 
freight  (so  sacred  yesterday),  while  women  and  girls 
scooped  the  spoils  from  mire  and  gutter  into  buckets, 
aprons  or  baskets,  and  ran  home  with  it  through  Jack 
son  Square  and  scurried  back  again  with  grain-sacks 
and  pillow-slips,  and  while  the  cotton  burned  on  and 
the  ships,  so  broadly  dark  aloft,  so  pale  in  their  war 
paint  below  and  so  alive  with  silent,  motionless  men, 
came  through  the  smoking  havoc. 

"No  uze  to  hope,"  cooed  the  grandmother  to  Flora, 
whose  gaze  clung  to  the  tree-veiled  top  of  Callender 
House.  "It  riff  use'  to  burn.  'T  is  not  a  so  inflam- 
mab'  like  that  rope  and  tar."  The  rope  and  tar  meant 
their  own  burnt  ship. 

"Ah,  well,"  was  the  light  reply,  "all  shall  be  for 
the  bes'!  Those  who  watch  the  game  close  and  play 
it  with  courage " 

"And  cheat  with  prudenze ?" 

"Yes!  to  them  God  is  good.  How  well  you  know 
that!  And  Anna,  too,  she's  learning  it — or  she  shall 
— dear  Anna!  Same  time  me,  I  am  well  content." 

"Oh,  you  are  joyful!  But  not  because  God  is  good, 
neither  juz'  biccause  those  Yankee'  they  arrive.  Ah, 
that  muz'  bring  some  splandid  news,  that  lett'r  of  Irbee, 
what  you  riscieve  to-day  and  think  I  don't  know  it. 
'T  is  maybe  ab-out  Kincaid's  Batt'rie,  eh?"  At 
Flora's  touch  the  speaker  flinched  back  from  the  roof's 
edge,  the  maiden  aiding  the  recoil. 

"Don't  stand  so  near,  like  that,"  she  said.  "It^ 
temp'  me  to  shove  you  over." 

They  looked  once  more  to  the  fleet.  Slowly  it 
came  on.  Near  its  line's  center  the  flag-ship  hovered 

289 


Kincaid's  Battery 

just  opposite  Canal  Street.  The  rear  was  far  down 
by  the  Mint.  Up  in  the  van  the  leading  vessel  was 
halting  abreast  St.  Mary's  Market,  a  few  hundred 
yards  behind  which,  under  black  clouds  and  on  an 
east  wind,  the  lone-star  flag  of  seceded  Louisiana 
floated  in  helpless  defiance  from  the  city  hall.  All 
at  once  heaven's  own  thunders  pealed.  From  a  warn 
ing  sprinkle  the  women  near  about  fled  down  a  roofed 
hatchway.  One  led  Madame.  But  on  such  a  scene 
Flora  craved  a  better  curtain-fall  and  she  lingered  alone. 
It  came.  As  if  all  its  millions  of  big  drops  raced 
for  one  prize  the  deluge  fell  on  city,  harbor,  and  fleet 
and  on  the  woe-smitten  land  from  horizon  to  horizon, 
while  in  the  same  moment  the  line  of  battle  dropped 
anchor  in  mid-stream.  With  a  swirling  mist  wetting 
her  fair  head  she  waved  in  dainty  welcome  Irby's 
letter  and  then  pressed  it  to  her  lips;  not  for  his  sake 
— hah! — but  for  his  rueful  word,  that  once  more  his 
loathed  cousin,  Anna's  Hilary!  was  riding  at  the  head 
of  Kincaid's  Battery. 

LIV 

SAME    APRIL   DAY    TWICE 

BLACK  was  that  Friday  for  the  daughters  of  Dixie. 
Farragut  demanded  surrender,  Lovell  declined.  The 
mayor,  the  council,  the  Committee  of  Public  Safety 
declined. 

On  Saturday  the  two  sides  parleyed  while  Lovell 
withdrew  his  forces.  On  Sunday  the  Foreign  Legion 
preserved  order  of  a  sort  highly  displeasing  to  "a 

290 


Same  April  Day  Twice 

plain  sailor,"  as  Farragut,  on  the  Hartford,  called 
himself,  and  to  all  the  plain  sailors  of  his  fleet — who 
by  that  time  may  have  been  hard  to  please.  On 
Monday  the  "plain  sailor"  bade  the  mayor,  who  had 
once  been  a  plain  stevedore,  remove  the  city's  women 
and  children  within  forty-eight  hours.  But  on  Tues 
day,  in  wiser  mood,  he  sent  his  own  blue-jackets,  cut 
lasses,  muskets  and  hand-dragged  howitzers,  lowered 
the  red-and-yellow-striped  flag  of  one  star  and  on 
mint  and  custom-house  ran  up  the  stars  and  stripes. 
Constance  and  Miranda,  from  their  distant  roof,  saw 
the  emblem  soar  to  the  breeze,  and  persuaded  Anna 
to  an  act  which  cost  her  as  many  hours  as  it  need  have 
taken  minutes — the  destruction  of  the  diary.  That 
was  on  the  twenty-ninth  of  April. 

Let  us  not  get  dates  confused.     "On  the  twenty- 
ninth   of   April,"    says   Grant,    "the   troops   were   at 
Hard  Times  (Arkansas),  and  the  fleet  (another  fleet), 
under  Admiral  Porter,  made  an  attack  upon  Grand 
Gulf  (Mississippi),  while  I  reconnoitered."     But  that 
twenty-ninth  was   a  year  later,   when   New   Orleans 
for  three  hundred  and  sixty-five  separate  soul-torturing  j 
days  had  been  sitting  in  the  twilight  of  her  captivity,  j 
often  writhing  and  raving  in  it,  starved  to  madness  j 
for  news  of  Lee's  and  Stonewall's  victories  and  of  her  I 
boys,  her  ragged,  gaunt,  superb,  bleeding,  dying,  on-! 
pressing  boys,  and  getting  only  such  dubious  crumbsl 
of  rumor  as  could  be  smuggled  in,  or  such  tainted  badj 
news  as  her  captors  delighted  to  offer  her  through^ 
the  bars  of  a  confiscated  press.     No  ?  did  the  treat 
ment  she  was  getting   merely — as   Irby,   with   much 
truth,    on    that    twenty-ninth    remarked    in  a  group 

291 


Kincaid's  Battery 

about  a  headquarters  camp-fire    near  Grand  Gulf — 
did  it  merely  seem  so  bad  to  poor  New  Orleans  ? 

Oh,  but! — as  the  dingy,  lean-faced  Hilary  cried, 
springing  from  the  ground  where  he  lay  and  jerking 
his  pipe  from  his  teeth — was  it  not  enough  for  a  world's 
pity  that  to  her  it  seemed  so?  How  it  seemed  to  the 
Callenders  in  particular  was  a  point  no  one  dared  raise 
where  he  was.  To  them  had  come  conditions  so  pe 
culiarly  distressing  and  isolating  that  they  were  not 
sharers  of  the  common  lot  around  them,  but  of  one 
strangely,  incalculably  worse.  Rarely  and  only  in 
guarded  tones  were  they  spoken  of  now  in  Kincaid's 
Battery,  lately  arrived  here,  covered  with  the  glory  of 
their  part  in  Bragg's  autumn  and  winter  campaign 
through  Tennessee  and  Kentucky,  and  with  Perry- 
ville,  Murfreesboro'  and  Stone  River  added  to  the  long 
list  on  their  standard.  Lately  arrived,  yes;  but  bring 
ing  with  them  as  well  as  meeting  here  a  word  appar 
ently  so  authentic  and  certainly  so  crushing,  (as  to  those 
sweet  Callenders),  that  no  one  ever  let  himself  hint 
toward  it  in  the  hearing  even  of  Charlie  Valcour,  much 
less  of  their  battle-scarred,  prison-wasted,  march-worn, 
grief-torn,  yet  still  bright-eyed,  brave-stepping,  brave- 
riding  Major.  Major  of  Kincaid's  Battalion  he  was 
now,  whose  whole  twelve  brass  pieces  had  that  morn 
ing  helped  the  big  iron  batteries  fight  Porter's  gun 
boats. 

" Finding  Grand  Gulf  too  strong,"  says  Grant,  "I 
moved  the  army  below,  running  the  batteries  there  as 
we  had  done  at  Vicksburg.  Learning  here  that  there 
was  a  good  road  from  Bruinsburg  up  to  Port  Gibson" 

(both  in  Mississippi),  "I  determined  to  cross " 

292 


Same  April  Day  Twice 

How  pleasantly  familiar  were  those  names  in  New 
Orleans.  Alike  commercially  and  socially  they  meant 
parterres,  walks,  bowers  in  her  great  back-garden. 
From  the  homes  of  the  rich  planters  around  the  towns 
and  landings  so  entitled,  and  from  others  all  up  and 
down  the  river  from  Natchez  to  Vicksburg  and  the 
Bends,  hailed  many  a  Carondelet  Street  nabob  and 
came  yearly  those  towering  steamboat-loads — those 
floating  cliffs — of  cotton-bales-  that  filled  presses,  ships 
and  bank-boxes  and  bought  her  imports — plows, 
shoes,  bagging,  spices,  silks  and  wines:  came  also 
their  dashing  sons  and  daughters,  to  share  and  heighten 
the  splendors  of  her  carnivals  and  lure  away  her  beaux 
and  belles  to  summer  outings  and  their  logical  results. 
In  all  the  region  there  was  hardly  a  family  with  which 
some  half-dozen  of  the  battery  were  not  acquainted, 
or  even  related. 

"  Home  again,  home  again  from  a  foreign  shore," 

sang  the  whole  eighty-odd,  every  ladies'  man  of  them, 
around  out-of-tune  pianos  with  girls  whose  brothers 
were  all  away  in  Georgia  and  Virginia,  some  forever 
at  rest,  some  about  to  fight  Chancellorsville.  Such 
a  chorus  was  singing  that  night  within  earshot  of  the 
headquarters  group  when  Ned  Ferry,  once  of  the  bat 
tery,  but  transferred  to  Harper's  cavalry,  rode  up  and 
was  led  by  Hilary  to  the  commanding  general  to  say 
that  Grant  had  crossed  the  river.  Piano  and  song 
hushed  as  the  bugles  rang,  and  by  daybreak  all  camps 
had  vanished  and  the  gray  columns  were  hurrying, 
horse,  foot,  and  wheels,  down  every  southerly  road  to 
crush  the  invader. 

293 


KincaicTs  Battery 

At  the  head  of  one  rode  General  Brodnax.  Hear 
ing  Hilary  among  his  staff  he  sent  for  him  and  began 
to  speak  of  Mandeville,  long  gone  to  Richmond  on  some 
official  matter  and  daily  expected  back;  and  then  he 
mentioned  "this  fellow  Grant,"  saying  he  had  known 
him  in  Mexico.  "And  now,"  he  concluded,  "he's 
the  toughest  old  he  one  they've  got." 

On  the  face  of  either  kinsman  there  came  a  fine 
smile  that  really  made  them  look  alike.  "We'll  try 
our  jaw-teeth  on  him  to-morrow,"  laughed  the  nephew. 

"Hilary,  you  weren't  one  of  those  singers  last  even 
ing,  were  you?" 

"Why,  no,  uncle,  for  once  you'll  be  pleased " 

" Not  by  a  dam-site !"  The  smile  was  gone.  "You 
know,  my  boy,  that  in  such  a  time  as  this  if  a  leader 
— and  above  all  such  a  capering,  high-kicking  colt  as 
you — begins  to  mope  and  droop  like  a  cab-horse  in  the 
rain,  his  men  will  soon  not  be  worth  a — what?  .  .  . 
Oh,  blast  the  others,  when  you  do  so  you're  moping, 
and  whether  your  men  can  stand  it  or  not,  I  can't! — 
what?  .  .  .  Well,  then,  for  God's  sake  don't!  For 
there's  another  point,  Hilary:  as  long  as  you  were 
every  night  a  *  ladies '  man'  and  every  day  a  laugher  at 
death  you  could  take  those  boys  through  hell-fire  at 
any  call;  but  if  they  once  get  the  notion — which  you 
came  mighty  near  giving  them  yesterday — that  you 
hold  their  lives  cheap  merely  because  you're  tired  of 
your  own,  they'll  soon  make  you  wish  you'd  never 
set  eyes  on  a  certain  friend  of  ours,  worse  than  you 
or  thoy  or  I  have  ever  wished  it  yet." 

"I've  never  wished  it  yet,  uncle.  I  can't.  I've 
never  believed  one  breath  of  all  we've  heard.  It's 

294 


Same  April  Day  Twice 

not    true.      It    can't    be,    simply    because    it    can't 
be." 

"Then  why  do  you  behave  as  if  it  were?" 
"I  won't,  uncle.  Honor  bright!  You  watch  me." 
And  next  day,  in  front  of  Port  Gibson,  through  all  the 
patter,  smoke,  and  crash,  through  all  the  charging,  cheer 
ing  and  volleying,  while  the  ever-thinning,  shortening 
gray  lines  were  being  crowded  back  from  rise  to  rise 
— back,  back  through  field,  grove,  hedge,  worm-fence 
and  farmyard,  clear  back  to  Grindstone  Ford,  Bayou 
Pierre,  and  with  the  cavalry,  Harper's,  cut  off  and 
driven  up  eastward  through  the  town — the  enraged  old 
brigadier  watched  and  saw.  He  saw  far,  saw  close, 
with  blasphemous  exultation,  how  Hilary  and  his  guns, 
called  here,  sent  there,  flashed,  thundered,  galloped, 
blazed,  howled  and  held  on  with  furious  valor  and 
bleeding  tenacity  yet  always  with  a  quick-sightedness 
which  just  avoided  folly  and  ruin,  and  at  length  stood 
rock  fast,  honor  bright,  at  North  Fork  and  held  it  till, 
except  the  cavalry,  the  last  gray  column  was  over  and 
the  bridges  safely  burning. 

That  night  Ned  Ferry — of  the  cavalry  withdrawn  to 
the  eastward  uplands  to  protect  that  great  source  of 
supplies  and  its  New  Orleans  and  Jackson  Railroad — 
was  made  a  lieutenant,  and  a  certain  brave  Charlotte, 
whom  later  he  loved  and  won,  bringing  New  Orleans 
letters  to  camp,  brought  also  such  news  of  the  foe  that 
before  dawn,  led  by  her,  Ferry's  Scouts  rode  their  first 
ride.  All  day  they  rode,  while  the  main  armies  lay 
with  North  Fork  between  them,  the  grays  entrenching, 
the  blues  rebridging.  When  at  sundown  she  and 
Ned  Ferry  parted,  and  at  night  he  bivouacked  his 

295 


Kincaid's  Battery 

men  for  a  brief  rest  in  a  black  solitude  from  which 
the  camp-fires  of  both  hosts  were  in  full  sight  and  the 
enemy's  bridge-building  easily  heard,  he  sought,  un- 
companioned,  Kincaid's  Battery  and  found  Hilary 
Kincaid.  War  is  what  Sherman  called  it,  who  two 
or  three  days  later,  at  Grand  Gulf  (evacuated),  crossed 
into  this  very  strife.  Yet  peace  (so-called)  and  riches 
rarely  bind  men  in  such  loving  pairs  as  do  cruel  toil, 
deadly  perils,  common  griefs,  exile  from  woman  and 
daily  experience  of  one  another's  sweetness,  valor, 
and  strength,  and  it  was  for  such  things  that  this  pair, 
loving  so  many  besides,  particularly  loved  each  other. 

With  glad  eyes  Kincaid  rose  from  a  log. 

"  Major,"  began  the  handsome  scout,  dapper  from 
kepi  to  spurs  in  contrast  to  the  worn  visage  and  dress 
of  his  senior,  but  Hilary  was  already  speaking. 

"My  gentle  Ned!"  he  cried.     "Lieutenant — Ferry!" 

Amid  kind  greetings  from  Captain  Bartleson  and 
others  the  eyes  of  the  two — Hilary's  so  mettlesome, 
Ferry's  so  placid — exchanged  meanings,  and  the  pair 
went  and  sat  alone  on  the  trail  of  a  gun;  on  Roaring 
Betsy's  knee,  as  it  were.  There  Hilary  heard  of  the 
strange  fair  guide  and  of  news  told  by  her  which 
brought  him  to  his  feet  with  a  cry  of  joy  that  drew 
the  glad  eyes  of  half  the  battery. 

"The  little  mother  saint  of  your  flag,  boys!"  he  ex 
plained  to  a  knot  of  them  later,  "the  little  godmother 
of  your  guns!"  The  Callenders  were  out  of  New 
Orleans,  banished  as  "registered  enemies." 


296 


In  Darkest  Dixie  and  Out 

LV 

IN   DARKEST  DIXIE   AND    OUT 

UNHAPPY  Callender  House!  Whether  "oppressors" 
or  " oppressed"  had  earliest  or  oftenest  in  that  first 
year  of  the  captivity  lifted  against  it  the  accusing 
finger  it  would  be  hard  to  tell. 

When  the  Ship  Island  transports  bore  their  blue 
thousands  up  the  river,  and  the  streets  roared  a  new 
drum-thunder,  before  the  dark  columns  had  settled 
down  in  the  cotton-yards,  public  squares,  Carrollton 
suburb  and  Jackson  Barracks,  Callender  House — you 
may  guess  by  whose  indirection — had  come  to  the  notice 
of  a  once  criminal  lawyer,  now  the  plumed  and  em 
blazoned  general-in-chief,  to  whom,  said  his  victims 
(possibly  biased),  no  offense  or  offender  was  too  small 
for  his  hectoring  or  chastisement. 

The  women  in  that  house,  that  nest  of  sedition,  he 
had  been  told,  at  second-hand,  had  in  the  very  dawn 
of  secession  completely  armed  the  famous  "Kincaid's 
Battery"  which  had  early  made  it  hot  for  him  about 
Yorktown.  Later  in  that  house  they  had  raised  a 
large  war-fund — still  somewhere  hidden.  The  day 
the  fleet  came  up  they  had  sent  their  carriage-horses 
to  Beauregard,  helped  signal  the  Chalmette  fortifica 
tions,  locked  ten  slaves  in  the  dwelling  under  shell 
fire  and  threatened  death  to  any  who  should  stir  to 
escape.  So  for  these  twelve  months,  with  only  Isaac, 
Ben,  and  their  wives  as  protectors  and  the  splendid 
freedom  to  lock  themselves  in,  they  had  suffered  the 
duress  of  a  guard  camped  in  the  grove,  their  every 

297 


Kincaid's  Battery 

townward  step  openly  watched  and  their  front  door 
draped  with  the  stars  and  stripes,  under  which  no 
feminine  acquaintance  could  be  enticed  except  the 
dear,  faithful  Valcours. 

But  where  were  old  friends  and  battery  sisters? 
All  estranged.  Could  not  the  Callenders  go  to  them 
and  explain?  Explain!  A  certain  man  of  not  one- 
fifth  their  public  significance  or  "secesh"  record, 
being  lightly  asked  on  the  street  if  he  had  not  yet 
"taken  the  oath'7  and  as  lightly  explaining  that  he 
"wasn't  going  to,"  had,  fame  said,  for  that  alone, 
been  sent  to  Ship  Island — where  Anna  "already 
belonged,"  as  the  commanding  general  told  the  three 
gentle  refusers  of  the  oath,  while  in  black  letters  on 
the  whited  wall  above  his  judgment  seat  in  the  custom 
house  they  read,  "No  distinction  made  here  between 
he  and  she  adders." 

But  could  not  the  Valcours,  those  strangely  immune, 
yet  unquestioned  true-lovers  of  poor  Dixie,  whose  marvel 
ous  tact  won  priceless  favors  for  so  many  distressed 
Dixie-ites,  have  explained  for  the  Callenders?  Flora 
had  explained! — to  both  sides,  in  opposite  ways, 
eagerly,  tenderly,  over  and  over,  with  moist  eyes,  yet 
ever  with  a  cunning  lameness  that  kept  convince- 
ment  misled  and  without  foothold.  Had  the  Callen 
ders  dwelt  up-town  the  truth  might  have  won  out; 
but  where  they  were,  as  they  were,  they  might  as  well 
;have  been  in  unspeakable  Boston.  And  so  by  her 
own  sweet  excusings  she  kept  alive  against  them  be 
liefs  or  phantoms  of  beliefs,  which  would  not  have 
lived  a  day  in  saner  times. 

Calumny  had  taken  two  forms:  the  monstrous  black 
298 


In  Darkest  Dixie  and  Out 

smoke  of  a  vulgar  version  and  the  superior  divinings 
of  the  socially  elect;  a  fine,  hidden  flame  fed  from 
the  smoke.  According  to  the  vulgate  the  three  ladies, 
incensed  at  a  perfectly  lawful  effort  to  use  their  horses 
for  the  Confederate  evacuation  and  actually  defying 
it  with  cocked  revolver,  had  openly  abjured  Dixie, 
renounced  all  purpose  to  fly  to  it  and,  denying  shelter 
to  their  own  wounded,  had  with  signal  flags  themselves 
guided  the  conquering  fleet  past  the  town's  inmost  de 
fenses  until  compelled  to  desist  by  a  Confederate  shell 
in  their  roof.  Unable  to  face  an  odium  so  well  earned 
they  had  clung  to  their  hiding,  glad  of  the  blue  camp 
in  their  grove,  living  fatly  on  the  bazaar's  proceeds 
and  having  high  times  with  such  noted  staff-officers 
as  Major  Greenleaf,  their  kindness  to  whom  in  the 
days  of  his  modest  lieutenancy  and  first  flight  and  of 
his  later  parole  and  exchange  was  not  so  hard  now  to 
see  through. 

Greenleaf  had  come  back  with  General  Banks  when 
Banks  had  succeeded  Butler.  Oppressed  with  military 
cares,  he  had  barely  time  to  be,  without  scrutiny,  a 
full  believer  in  the  Valcours'  loyalty  to  the  Union. 
Had  they  not  avowed  it  to  him  when  to  breathe  it  was 
peril,  on  that  early  day  when  Irby's  command  became 
Kincaid's  Battery,  and  in  his  days  of  Parish  Prison 
and  bazaar?  How  well  those  words  fitly  spoken  had 
turned  out!  "Like  apples  of  gold,"  sang  Flora  to 
the  timorous  grandmother,  "in  wrappers  of  green 
backs." 

All  the  more  a  believer  was  he  because  while  other 
faithfuls  were  making  their  loyalty  earn  big  money 
off  the  government  this  genteel  pair,  reminding  him 

299 


Kincaid's  Battery 

that  they  might  yet  have  to  risk  themselves  inside  the 
gray  lines  again  to  extricate  Charlie,  had  kept  their 
loyalty  as  gracefully  hidden  as  of  old  except  from  a 
general  or  two.  Preoccupied  Greenleaf,  amiable 
generals,  not  to  see  that  a  loyalist  in  New  Orleans 
stood  socially  at  absolute  zero,  whereas  to  stand  at  the 
social  ebullition  point  was  more  to  the  Valcours  than 
fifty  Unions,  a  hundred  Dixies  and  heaven  beside. 
It  was  that  fact,  more  than  any  other,  save  one,  which 
lent  intrepidity  to  Flora's  perpetual,  ever  quickening 
dance  on  the  tight-rope  of  intrigue;  a  performance 
in  which  her  bonny  face  had  begun  to  betray  her  dis 
covery  that  she  could  neither  slow  down  nor  dance 
backward.  However,  every  face  had  come  to  betray 
some  cruel  strain;  Constance's,  Anna's,  even  Victorine's 
almond  eyes  and  Miranda's  baby  wrinkles.  Yes,  the 
Valcours,  too,  had,  nevertheless,  their  monetary  gains, 
but  these  were  quiet  and  exclusively  from  their  ever 
dear,  however  guilty,  "rebel"  friends,  who  could  not 
help  making  presents  to  Madame  when  brave  Flora, 
spurning  all  rewards  but  their  love,  got  for  them,  by 
some  spell  they  could  not  work,  Federal  indulgences; 
got  them  through  those  one  or  two  generals,  who — 
odd  coincidence! — always  knew  the  "rebel"  city's 
latest  "rebel"  news  and  often  made  stern  use  of  it. 

Full  believer  likewise,  and  true  sorrower,  was  Green- 
leaf,  in  Hilary's  death,  having  its  seeming  proof  from 
Constance  and  Miranda  as  well  as  from  Flora.  For 
in  all  that  twelvemonth  the  Callenders  had  got  no  glad 
tidings,  even  from  Mandeville.  Battle,  march  and  de 
vastation,  march,  battle  and  devastation  had  made  letters 
as  scarce  as  good  dreams,  in  brightest  Dixie.  But  dark- 

300 


In  Darkest  Dixie  and  Out 

est  Dixie  was  New  Orleans.  There  no  three  "damned 
secesh"  might  stop  on  a  corner  in  broadest  sunlight  and 
pass  the  time  of  day.  There  the  "rebel'7  printing- 
presses  stood  cold  in  dust  and  rust.  There  churches 
were  shut  and  bayonet-guarded  because  their  ministers 
would  not  read  the  prayers  ordered  by  the  "oppressor," 
and  there,  for  being  on  the  street  after  nine  at  night, 
ladies  of  society,  diners-out,  had  been  taken  to  the  lock 
up  and  the  police-court.  In  New  Orleans  all  news  but 
bad  news  was  contraband  to  any  "he  or  she  adder,"  but 
four-fold  contraband  to  the  Calenders,  the  fairest  mem 
ber  of  whose  trio,  every  time  a  blue-and-gold  cavalier 
forced  her  conversation,  stung  him  to  silence  with  some 
word  as  mild  as  a  Cordelia's.  And  yet,  (you  demur,) 
in  the  course  of  a  whole  year,  by  some  kind  luck,  surely 
the  blessed  truth —  Ah,  the  damsel  on  the  tight-rope 
took  care  against  that!  It  was  part  of  her  dance  to 
drop  from  that  perch  as  daintily  as  a  bee-martin  way 
laying  a  hive,  devour  each  home-coming  word  as  he 
devours  bees,  and  flit  back  and  twitter  and  flutter  as  a 
part  of  all  nature's  harmony,  though  in  chills  of  dis 
may  at  her  peril  and  yet  burning  to  go  to  Hilary,  from 
whom  this  task  alone  forever  held  her  away. 

So  throughout  that  year  Anna  had  been  to  Green- 
leaf  the  veiled  widow  of  his  lost  friend,  not  often  or 
long,  and  never  blithely  met;  loved  more  ardently 
than  ever,  more  reverently;  his  devotion  holding  itself 
in  a  fancied  concealment  transparent  to  all;  he  de 
fending  and  befriending  her,  yet  only  as  he  could 
without  her  knowledge,  and  incurring  a  certain  stigma 
from  his  associates  and  superiors,  if  not  an  actual 
distrust.  A  whole  history  of  itself  would  be  the  daily, 

301 


KincaicTs  Battery 

nightly,  monthly  war  of  passions  between  him,  her, 
Flora,  and  those  around  them,  but  time  flies. 

One  day  Greenleaf ,  returning  from  a  week-long  circuit 
of  outposts,  found  awaiting  him  a  letter  bearing  North 
ern  imprints  of  mailing  and  forwarding,  from  Hilary 
Kincaid,  written  long  before  in  prison  and  telling  an 
other  whole  history,  of  a  kind  so  common  in  war  that  we 
have  already  gone  by  it;  a  story  of  being  left  for  dead 
in  the  long  stupor  of  a  brain  hurt ;  of  a  hairbreadth  es 
cape  from  living  burial;  of  weeks  in  hospital  unidenti 
fied,  all  sense  of  identity  lost;  and  of  a  daring  feat  of  sur 
gery,  with  swift  mental,  not  so  swift  bodil>,  recovery. 
Inside  the  letter  was  one  to  Anna.  But  Anna  was  gone. 
Two  days  earlier,  without  warning,  the  Callenders 
— as  much  to  Flora's  affright  as  to  their  relief,  and 
"as  much  for  Fred's  good  as  for  anything,"  said  his 
obdurate  general  when  Flora  in  feigned  pity  pleaded 
for  their  stay — had  been  deported  into  the  Confeder 
acy. 

"Let  me  carry  it  to  her,"  cried  Flora  to  Greenleaf, 
rapturously  clasping  the  letter  and  smiling  heroically. 
"We  can  overtague  them,  me  and  my  gran'mama! 
And  then,  thanks  be  to  God!  my  brother  we  can 
bring  him  back!  Maybe  also — ah!  maybee!  I  can 
obtain  yo'  generals  some  uzeful  news!" 

After  some  delay  the  pair  were  allowed  to  go.  At 
the  nearest  gray  outpost,  in  a  sudden  shower  of  the 
first  true  news  for  a  week — the  Mississippi  crossed, 
Grant  victorious  at  Port  Gibson  and  joined  by  Sher 
man  at  Grand  Gulf — Flora  learned,  to  her  further 
joy,  that  the  Callenders,  misled  by  report  that  Brod- 
nax's  brigade  was  at  Mobile,  had  gone  eastward,  as 

302 


In  Darkest  Dixie  and  Out 

straight  away  from  Brodnax  and  the  battery  as  Gulf- 
shore  roads  could  take  them,  across  a  hundred-mile 
stretch  of  townless  pine-barrens  with  neither  railway 
nor  telegraph. 

Northward,  therefore,  with  Madame  on  her  arm, 
sprang  Flora,  staggeringly,  by  the  decrepit  Jackson 
Railroad,  along  the  quiet  eastern  bound  of  a  region 
out  of  which,  at  every  halt,  came  gloomy  mention  of 
Tallahala  River  and  the  Big  Black;  of  Big  Sandy, 
Five  Mile  and  Fourteen  Mile  creeks;  of  Logan,  Sher 
man  and  Grant;  of  Bowen,  Gregg,  Brodnax  and 
Harper,  and  of  daily  battle  rolling  northward  barely 
three  hours'  canter  away.  So  they  reached  Jackson, 
capital  of  the  state  and  base  of  General  Joe  Johnston's 
army.  They  found  it  in  high  ferment  and  full  of  strag 
glers  from  a  battle  lost  that  day  at  Raymond  scarcely 
twenty  miles  down  the  Port  Gibson  road,  and  on  the 
day  following  chanced  upon  Mandeville  returning  at  last 
from  Richmond.  With  him  they  turned  west,  again 
by  rail,  and  about  sundown,  at  Big  Black  Bridge,  ten 
miles  east  of  Vicksburg,  found  themselves  clasping 
hands  in  open  air  with  General  Brodnax,  Irby  and 
Kincaid,  close  before  the  torn  brigade  and  the  wasted, 
cheering  battery.  Angels  dropped  down  they  seemed, 
tenderly  begging  off  from  all  talk  of  the  Callenders, 
who,  Flora  distressfully  said,  had  been  "grozzly  ex 
aggerated,"  while,  nevertheless,  she  declared  herself, 
with  starting  tears,  utterly  unable  to  explain  why  on 
earth  they  had  gone  to  Mobile — "unlezz  the  bazaar." 
No  doubt,  however,  they  would  soon  telegraph  by 
way  of  Jackson.  But  next  day,  while  she,  as  mistress 
of  a  field  hospital,  was  winning  adoration  on  every  side, 

3°3 


KincaicTs  Battery 

Jackson,  only  thirty  miles  off  but  with  every  wire  cut, 
fell,  clad  in  the  flames  of  its  military  factories,  mills, 
foundries  and  supplies  and  of  its  eastern,  Pearl  River, 
bridge. 

LVI 

BETWEEN  THE    MILLSTONES 

TELEGRAPH!  They  had  been  telegraphing  for  days, 
but  their  telegrams  have  not  yet  been  delivered. 

On  the  evening  when  the  camps  of  Johnston  and 
Grant  with  burning  Jackson  between  them  put  out 
half  the  stars  a  covered  carriage,  under  the  unsolicited 
escort  of  three  or  four  gray-jacketed  cavalrymen  and 
driven  by  an  infantry  lad  seeking  his  command  after 
an  illness  at  home,  crossed  Pearl  River  in  a  scow  at 
Ratcliff's  ferry  just  above  the  day's  battle-field. 

''When  things  are  this  bad,"  said  the  boy  to  the  per 
son  seated  beside  him  and  to  two  others  at  their  back, 
his  allusion  being  to  their  self-appointed  guard,  "any 
man  you  find  straggling  to  the  front  is  the  kind  a  lady 
can  trust." 

This  equipage  had  come  a  three  hours'  drive,  from 
the  pretty  town  of  Brandon,  nearest  point  to  which  a 
railway  train  from  the  East  would  venture,  and  a 
glimpse  into  the  vehicle  would  have  shown  you,  be 
hind  Constance  and  beside  Miranda,  Anna,  pale,  ill, 
yet  meeting  every  inquiry  with  a  smiling  request  to 
push  on.  They  were  attempting  a  circuit  of  both 
armies  to  reach  a  third,  Pemberton's,  on  the  Big  Black 
and  in  and  around  Vicksburg. 

Thus  incited  they  drove  on  in  the  starlight  over  the 

3°4 


Between  the  Millstones 

gentle  hills  of  Madison  county  and  did  not  accept  repose 
until  they  had  put  Grant  ten  miles  behind  and  crossed 
to  the  south  side  of  the  Vicksburg  and  Jackson  Rail 
road  at  Clinton  village  with  only  twenty  miles  more 
between  them  and  Big  Black  Bridge.  The  springs 
of  Anna's  illness  were  more  in  spirit  than  body.  Else 
she  need  not  have  lain  sleepless  that  night  at  Clinton's 
many  cross-roads,  still  confronting  a  dilemma  she  had 
encountered  in  Mobile. 

In  Mobile  the  exiles  had  learned  the  true  whereabouts 
of  the  brigade,  and  of  a  battery  then  called  Bartleson's  as 
often  as  Kincaid's  by  a  public  which  had  half  forgot 
ten  the  seemingly  well-established  fact  of  Hilary's  death. 
Therein  was  no  new  shock.  The  new  shock  had 
come  when,  as  the  three  waited  for  telegrams,  they 
stood  before  a  vast  ironclad  still  on  the  ways  but  offer 
ing  splendid  protection  from  Farragut's  wooden  ter 
rors  if  only  it  could  be  completed,  yet  on  which  work 
had  ceased  for  lack  of  funds  though  a  greater  part  of 
the  needed  amount,  already  put  up,  lay  idle  solely  be 
cause  it  could  .not  be  dragged  up  to  a  total  that  would 
justify  its  outlay. 

"How  much  does  it  fall  short?"  asked  Anna  with 
a  heart  at  full  stop,  and  the  pounding  shock  came  when 
the  shortage  proved  less  than  the  missing  proceeds 
of  the  bazaar.  For  there  heaved  up  the  problem, 
whether  to  pass  on  in  the  blind  hope  of  rinding  her 
heart's  own,  or  to  turn  instead  and  seek  the  two  de 
tectives  and  the  salvation  of  a  city.  This  was  the 
dilemma  which  in  the  last  few  days  had  torn  half  the 
life  out  of  her  and,  more  gravely  than  she  knew,  was 
threatening  the  remnant. 

305 


Kincaid's  Battery 

Constance  and  Miranda  yearned,  yet  did  not  dare, 
to  urge  the  latter  choice.  They  talked  it  over  covertly 
on  the  back  seat  of  the  carriage,  Anna  sitting  bravely 
in  front  with  the  young  "web-foot,"  as  their  wheels 
next  day  plodded  dustily  westward  out  of  Clinton. 
Hilary  would  never  be  found,  of  course;  and  if  found 
how  would  he  explain  why  he,  coming  through  what 
ever  vicissitudes,  he  the  ever  ready,  resourceful  and 
daring,  he  the  men's  and  ladies'  man  in  one,  whom  to 
look  upon  drew  into  his  service  whoever  looked,  had 
for  twelve  months  failed  to  get  so  much  as  one  spoken 
or  written  word  to  Anna  Callender;  to  their  heart 
broken  Nan,  the  daily  sight  of  whose  sufferings  had 
sharpened  their  wits  and  strung  their  hearts  to  blame 
whoever,  on  any  theory,  could  be  blamed.  Undoubt 
edly  he  might  have  some  dazzling  explanation  ready, 
but  that  explanation  they  two  must  first  get  of  him 
before  she  should  know  that  her  dead  was  risen. 

Our  travellers  were  minus  their  outriders  now.  At 
dawn  the  squad,  leaving  tender  apologies  in  the  night's 
stopping-place,  had  left  the  ladies  also,  not  foreseeing 
that  demoralized  servants  would  keep  them  there  with 
torturing  delays  long  into  the  forenoon.  When  at 
length  the  three  followed  they  found  highways  in 
ruin,  hoof-deep  in  dust  and  no  longer  safe  from  blue 
scouts,  while  their  infantry  boy  proved  as  innocent  of 
road  wisdom  as  they,  and  on  lonely  by-ways  led  them 
astray  for  hours.  We  may  picture  their  bodily  and 
mental  distress  to  hear,  at  a  plantation  house  whose 
hospitality  they  craved  when  the  day  was  near  its  end, 
that  they  were  still  but  nine  miles  from  Clinton  with 
eleven  yet  between  them  and  Big  Black  Bridge. 


Between  the  Millstones 

Yet  they  could  have  wept  for  thanks  as  readily  as 
for  chagrin  or  fatigue,  so  kindly  were  they  taken  in, 
so  stirring  was  the  next  word  of  news. 

"Why,  you  po'  city  child'en!"  laughed  two  sweet 
unprotected  women.  "Let  these  girls  bresh  you  off. 
You  sho'ly  got  the  hafe  o'  Hinds  County  on  you.  .  .  . 
Pemberton's  men?  Law,  no;  they  wuz  on  Big  Black 
but  they  right  out  here,  now,  on  Champion's  Hill,  in 
sight  f'om  our  gin-house.  .  .  .  Brodnax'  bri' — now, 
how  funny !  We  jess  heard  o'  them  about  a'  hour  ago, 
f'om  a  bran'  new  critter  company  name'  Ferry's 
Scouts.  Why,  Ferry's  f'om  yo'  city!  Wish  you  could 
'a'  seen  him — oh,  all  of  'em,  they  was  that  slick !  But, 
oh,  slick  aw  shabby,  when  our  men  ah  fine  they  ah 
fine,  now,  ain't  they !  There  was  a  man  ridin'  with  him 
— dressed  diff'ent — he  wuz  the  batteredest-lookin', 
gayest,  grandest — he  might  'a'  been  a  gen'al!  when 
in  fact  he  was  only  a  ma  jo',  an'  it  was  him  we  heard 
say  that  Brodnax  was  some'uz  on  the  south  side  o' 
the  railroad  and  couldn't  come  up  befo'  night.  .  .  . 
What,  us?  no,  we  on  the  nawth  side.  You  didn't 
notice  when  you  recrossed  the  track  back  yondeh? 
Well,  you  must  'a'  been  ti-ud!" 

Anna  dropped  a  fervid  word  to  Miranda  that  set 
their  hostesses  agape.  "Now,  good  Lawd,  child, 
ain't  you  in  hahdship  and  dangeh  enough?  Not  one 
o'  you  ain't  goin'  one  step  fu'ther  this  day.  Do  you 
want  to  git  shot  ?  Grant's  men  are  a-marchin'  into 
Bolton's  Depot  right  now.  Why,  honey,  you  might  as 
well  go  huntin'  a  needle  in  a  haystack  as  to  go  lookin' 
fo'  Brodnax's  brigade  to-night.  Gen'al  Pemberton  him 
self — why,  he'd  jest  send  you  to  his  rear,  and  that's 

307 


Kincaid's  Battery 

Vicksburg,  where  they  a-bein'  shelled  by  the  boats  day 
and  night,  and  the  women  and  child'en  a-livin'  in  caves. 
You  don't  want  to  go  there?" 

"We  don't  know,"  drolly  replied  Anna. 

"Well,  you  stay  hyuh.  That's  what  that  ma  jo'  told 
us.  Says  Je,  *  Ladies,  we  got  to  fight  a  battle  here  to 
morrow,  but  yo'-all's  quickest  way  out  of  it'll  be  to  stay 
right  hyuh.  There'll  be  no  place  like  home  to-morrow, 
not  even  this  place,'  says  'e,  with  a  sort  o'  twinkle  that 
made  us  laugh  without  seein'  anything  to  laugh  at!" 

LVII 

GATES  OF  HELL  AND  GLORY 

THE  next  sun  rose  fair  over  the  green,  rolling,  open 
land,  rich  in  half -grown  crops  of  cotton  and  corn  be 
tween  fence-rows  of  persimmon  and  sassafras.  Before 
it  was  high  the  eager  Callenders  were  out  on  a  main 
road.  Their  Mobile  boy  had  left  them  and  given  the 
reins  to  an  old  man,  a  disabled  and  paroled  soldier 
bound  homeward  into  Vicksburg.  Delays  plagued 
them  on  every  turn.  At  a  cross-road  they  were  com 
pelled  to  wait  for  a  large  body  of  infantry,  followed 
by  its  ordnance  wagons,  to  sweep  across  their  path  with 
the  long,  swift  stride  of  men  who  had  marched  for  two 
years  and  which  changed  to  a  double-quick  as  they 
went  over  a  hill-top.  Or  next  they  had  to  draw  wildly 
aside  into  the  zigzags  of  a  worm-fence  for  a  column 
of  galloping  cavalry  and  shroud  their  heads  from  its 
stifling  dust  while  their  driver  hung  to  his  mules' 
heads  by  the  bits.  More  than  once  they  caught  from 

308 


Gates  of  Hell  and  Glory 

some  gentle  rise  a  backward  glimpse  of  long  thin  lines 
puffing  and  crackling  at  each  other;  oftener  and  more 
and  more  they  heard  the  far  resound  of  artillery,  the 
shuffling,  clattering  flight  of  shell,  and  their  final  peal 
as  they  reported  back  to  the  guns  that  had  sent  them; 
and  once,  when  the  ladies  asked  if  a  certain  human 
note,  rarefied  by  distance,  was  not  the  hurrahing  of 
boys  on  a  school-ground,  the  old  man  said  no,  it  was 
"the  Yanks  charging.''  But  never,  moving  or  stand 
ing  from  aides  or  couriers  spurring  to  front  or  flank, 
or  from  hobbling  wounded  men  or  unhurt  stragglers 
footing  to  the  rear,  could  they  gather  a  word  as  to 
Brodnax's  brigade  or  Kincaid's  Battery. 

"Kincaid's  Battery  hell!  You  get  those  ladies  out 
oj  this  as  fast  as  them  mules  can  skedaddle." 

By  and  by  ambulances  and  then  open  wagons  began 
to  jolt  and  tilt  past  them  full  of  ragged,  grimy,  bloody 
men  wailing  and  groaning,  no  one  heeding  the  entreaties 
of  the  three  ladies  to  be  taken  in  as  nurses.  Near  a 
cross-road  before  them  they  saw  on  a  fair  farmhouse  the 
yellow  flag,  and  a  vehicle  or  two  at  its  door,  yet  no  load 
of  wounded  turned  that  way.  Out  of  it,  instead,  ex 
cited  men  were  hurrying,  some  lamely,  feebly,  afoot, 
others  at  better  speed  on  rude  litters,  but  all  rearward 
across  the  plowed  land.  Two  women  stepped  out  into 
a  light  trap  and  vanished  behind  a  lane  hedge  before 
Constance  could  call  the  attention  of  her  companions. 

"Why,  Nan,  if  we  didn't  know  she  was  in  New  Or 
leans  I'd  stand  the  world  down  that  that  was  Flora!" 

There  was  no  time  for  debate.  All  at  once,  in  plain 
sight,  right  at  hand,  along  a  mask  of  young  willows 
in  the  near  left  angle  of  the  two  roads,  from  a  double 

309 


KincaicTs  Battery 

line  of  gray  infantry  whose  sudden  apparition  had 
startled  Anna  and  Miranda,  rang  a  long  volley.  From 
a  fringe  of  woods  on  the  far  opposite  border  the  foe's 
artillery  pealed,  and  while  the  Callenders'  mules  went 
into  agonies  of  fright  the  Federal  shells  began  to  stream 
and  scream  across  the  space  and  to  burst  before  and  over 
the  gray  line  lying  flat  in  the  furrows  and  darting  back 
fire  and  death.  With  their  quaking  equipage  hugging 
the  farther  side  of  the  way  the  veiled  ladies  leaned 
out  to  see,  but  drew  in  as  a  six-mule  wagon  coming  from 
the  front  at  wild  speed  jounced  and  tottered  by  them. 
It  had  nearly  passed  when  with  just  a  touch  of  hubs  it 
tossed  them  clear  off  the  road,  smashing  one  of  their 
wheels  for  good  and  all.  Some  one  sprang  and  held 
their  terrified  mules  and  they  alighted  on  a  roadside 
bank  counting  themselves  already  captured. 

"Look  out,  everybody,"  cried  a  voice,  "here  come 
our  own  guns,  six  of  Jem,  like  hell  to  split!"  and  in  a 
moment  the  way  was  cleared. 

A  minute  before  this,  down  the  cross-road,  south 
ward  a  quarter  of  a  mile  or  so,  barely  out  of  sight  be 
hind  fence-rows,  the  half  of  a  battalion  of  artillery  had 
halted  in  column,  awaiting  orders.  With  two  or  three 
lesser  officers  a  general,  galloping  by  it  from  behind, 
had  drawn  up  on  a  slight  rise  at  the  southwest  corner 
of  the  fire-swept  field,  taken  one  glance  across  it  and 
said,  "Hilary,  can  your  ladies'  men  waltz  into  action 
in  the  face  of  those  guns?" 

"They  can  dance  the  figure,  General." 

"Take  them  in." 

Bartleson,  watching,  had  mounted  drivers  and  can 
noneers  before  Kincaid  could  spur  near  enough  to  call, 

310 


Gates  of  Hell  and  Glory 

"Column,  forward!"  and  turn  again  toward  the  Gen 
eral  and  the  uproar  beyond.  The  column  had  barely 
stretched  out  when,  looking  back  on  it  as  he  quick 
ened  pace,  Hilary's  cry  was,  "Battery,  trot,  march!" 
So  the  six  guns  had  come  by  the  general:  first  Hilary, 
sword  out,  pistols  in  belt;  then  his  adjutant;  then  bugler 
and  guidon,  and  then  Bartleson  and  the  boys;  horses 
striding  out — ah,  there  were  the  Callenders'  own  span! 
— whips  cracking,  carriages  thumping  and  rumbling, 
guns  powder-blackened  and  brown,  their  wheels, 
trails,  and  limbers  chipped  and  bitten,  and  their  own 
bronze  pock-pitted  by  the  flying  iron  and  lead  of  other 
fights,  and  the  heroes  in  saddle  and  on  chests — with 
faces  as  war-worn  as  the  wood  and  metal  and  brute 
life  under  them — cheering  as  they  passed.  Six  clouds 
of  dust  in  one  was  all  the  limping  straggler  had  seen 
when  he  called  his  glad  warning,  for  a  tall  hedge  lined 
half  the  cross-road  up  which  the  whirlwind  came; 
but  a  hundred  yards  or  so  short  of  the  main  way  the 
whole  battery,  still  shunning  the  field  because  of 
spongy  ground,  swept  into  full  view  at  a  furious  gallop. 
Yet  only  as  a  single  mass  was  it  observed,  and  despite  all 
its  thunder  of  wheels  was  seen  only,  not  heard.  Around 
the  Callenders  was  a  blindfold  of  dust  and  vehicles, 
of  shouting  and  smoke,  and  out  in  the  field  the  roar 
of  musketry  and  howling  and  bursting  of  shell.  Even 
Flora,  in  her  ambulance  close  beyond  both  roads, 
watching  for  the  return  of  a  galloping  messenger  and 
seeing  Hilary  swing  round  into  the  highway,  low  bent 
over  his  charger  at  full  run,  knew  him  only  as  he  van 
ished  down  it  hidden  by  the  tempest  of  hoofs,  wheels, 
and  bronze  that  whirled  after  him. 

311 


Kincaid's  Battery 

At  Anna's  side  among  the  rearing,  trembling  teams 
a  mounted  officer,  a  surgeon,  Flora's  messenger,  was 
commanding  and  imploring  her  to  follow  Constance 
and  Miranda  into  the  wagon  which  had  wrecked  their 
conveyance.  And  so,  alas!  all  but  trampling  her 
down,  yet  unseeing  and  unseen  though  with  her  in  every 
leap  of  his  heart,  he  who  despite  her  own  prayers  was 
more  to  her  than  a  country's  cause  or  a  city's  deliver 
ance  flashed  by,  while  in  the  dust  and  thunder  of  the 
human  avalanche  that  followed  she  stood  asking 
whose  battery  was  this  and  with  drowned  voice  cry 
ing,  as  she  stared  spell-bound,  "Oh,  God!  is  it  only 
Bartleson's?  Oh,  God  of  mercy!  where  is  Hilary 
Kincaid?"  A  storm  of  shell  burst  directly  overhead. 
Men  and  beasts  in  the  whirling  battery,  and  men  and 
beasts  close  about  her  wailed,  groaned,  fell.  Anna 
was  tossed  into  the  wagon,  the  plunging  guns,  dragging 
their  stricken  horses,  swept  out  across  the  field,  the 
riot  of  teams,  many  with  traces  cut,  whipped  madly 
away,  and  still,  thrown  about  furiously  in  the  flying 
wagon,  she  gazed  from  her  knees  and  mutely  prayed, 
but  saw  no  Hilary  because  while  she  looked  for  a  rider 
his  horse  lay  fallen. 

Never  again  came  there  to  that  band  of  New  Orleans 
boys  such  an  hour  of  glory  as  this  at  Champion's 
Hill.  For  two  years  more,  by  the  waning  light  of  a 
doomed  cause,  they  fought  on,  won  fame  and  honor; 
but  for  blazing  splendor — of  daring,  skill,  fortitude, 
loss  and  achievement  which  this  purblind  world  still 
sees  plainest  in  fraternal  slaughter — that  was  the  might 
iest  hour,  the  mightiest  ten  minutes,  ever  spent,  from 
9 Sixty-one  to  'Sixty-five,  by  Kincaid's  Battery. 

312 


Gates  of  Hell  and  Glory 

Right  into  the  face  of  death's  hurricane  sprang  the 
ladies'  man,  swept  the  ladies'  men.  "  Battery,  trot, 
walk.  Forward  into  battery!  Action  front!"  It  was 
at  that  word  that  Kincaid's  horse  went  down;  but  while 
the  pieces  trotted  round  and  unlimbered  and  the  Federal 
guns  vomited  their  fire  point-blank  and  blue  skirmish 
ers  crackled  and  the  gray  line  crackled  back,  and  while 
lead  and  iron  whined  and  whistled,  and  chips,  sand 
and  splinters  flew,  and  a  dozen  boys  dropped,  the  steady 
voice  of  Bartleson  gave  directions  to  each  piece  by 
number,  for  " solid  shot,"  or  "case"  or  "double 
canister."  Only  one  great  blast  the  foe's  artillery 
got  in  while  their  opponents  loaded,  and  then,  with 
roar  and  smoke  as  if  the  earth  had  burst,  Kincaid's 
Battery  answered  like  the  sweep  of  a  scythe.  Ah, 
what  a  harvest!  Instantly  the  guns  were  wrapped  in 
their  own  white  cloud,  but,  as  at  Shiloh,  they  were 
pointed  again,  again  and  again  by  the  ruts  of  their 
recoil,  Kincaid  and  Bartleson  each  pointing  one  as  its 
nine  men  dwindled  to  five  and  to  four,  and  in  ten  min 
utes  nothing  more  was  to  be  done  but  let  the  gray  line 
through  with  fixed  bayonets  while  Charlie,  using  one 
of  Hilary's  worn-out  quips,  stood  on  Roaring  Betsy's 
trunnion-plates  and  cursed  out  to  the  shattered  foe, 
"Bricks,  lime  and  sand  always  on  hand!  — ,  — ,  — !" 

Yet  this  was  but  a  small  part  of  the  day's  fight, 
and  Champion's  Hill  was  a  lost  battle.  Next  day  the 
carnage  was  on  Baker's  Creek  and  at  Big  Black  Bridge, 
and  on  the  next  Vicksburg  was  invested. 


Kincaid's  Battery 
LVIII 

ARACHNE 

BEHOLD,  "Vicksburg  and  the  Bends." 
In  one  of  those  damp  June-hot  caves  galleried  into 
the  sheer  yellow-clay  sides  of  her  deep-sunken  streets, 
desolate  streets  where  Porter's  great  soaring,  howling, 
burrowing  " lamp-posts"  blew  up  like  steamboats 
and  flew  forty  ways  in  search  of  women  and  children, 
dwelt  the  Callenders.  Out  among  Pemberton's  trenches 
and  redans,  where  the  woods  were  dense  on  the  crowns 
and  faces  of  the  landside  bluffs,  and  the  undergrowth 
was  thick  in  the  dark  ravines,  the  minie-ball  forever 
buzzed  and  pattered,  and  every  now  and  then  dabbed 
mortally  into  some  head  or  breast.  There  ever  closer 
and  closer  the  blue  boys  dug  and  crept  while  they  and 
the  gray  tossed  back  and  forth  the  hellish  hand-grenade, 
the  heavenly  hard-tack  and  tobacco,  gay  jokes  and 
lighted  bombs.  There,  mining  and  countermining, 
they  blew  one  another  to  atoms,  or  under  shrieking 
shells  that  tore  limbs  from  the  trees  and  made  missiles 
of  them  hurled  themselves  to  the  assault  and  were 
hurled  back.  There,  in  a  ruined  villa  whose  shrubberies 
Kincaid  named  "Carrollton  Gardens,"  quartered  old 
Brodnax,  dining  on  the  fare  we  promised  him  from  the 
first,  and  there  the  nephew  sang  an  ancient  song  from 
which,  to  please  his  listeners,  he  had  dropped  "old 
Ireland"  and  made  it  run: 

"O,  my  heart's  in  New  Orleans  wherever  I  go " 

meaning,  for  himself,  that  wherever  roamed  a  certain 


Arachne 

maiden  whose  whereabouts  in  Dixie  he  could  only  con 
jecture,  there  was  the  New  Orleans  of  his  heart. 

One  day  in  the  last  week  of  the  siege  a  young  mother 
in  the  Calenders'  cave  darted  out  into  the  sunshine 
to  rescue  her  straying  babe  and  was  killed  by  a  lump 
of  iron.  Bombardments  rarely  pause  for  slips  like 
that,  yet  the  Callenders  ventured  to  her  burial  in  a  grave 
yard  not  far  from  "Carrollton  Gardens."  As  sympa 
thy  yet  takes  chances  with  contagions  it  took  them  then 
with  shells. 

Flora  Valcour  daily  took  both  risks — with  contagions 
in  a  field  hospital  hard  by  the  cemetery,  and  with  shells 
and  stray  balls  when  she  fled  at  moments  from  the 
stinking  wards  to  find  good  air  and  to  commune  with 
her  heart's  desires  and  designs.  There  was  one  hazard 
beside  which  foul  air  and  stray  shots  were  negligible, 
a  siege  within  this  siege.  To  be  insured  against  the 
mere  mathematical  risk  that  those  designs,  thus  far 
so  fortunate,  might  by  any  least  mishap,  in  the  snap 
of  a  finger,  come  to  naught  she  would  have  taken 
chances  with  the  hugest  shell  Grant  or  Porter  could 
send.  For  six  weeks  Anna  and  Hilary — Anna  not 
knowing  if  he  was  alive,  he  thinking  her  fifty  leagues 
away — had  been  right  here,  hardly  an  hour's  walk 
asunder.  With  what  tempest  of  heart  did  the  severed 
pair  rise  at  each  dawn,  lie  down  each  night;  but  Flora 
suffered  no  less.  Let  either  of  the  two  get  but  one 
glimpse,  hear  but  one  word,  of  the  other,  and — better 
a  shell,  slay  whom  it  might. 

On  her  granddaughter's  brow  Madame  Valcour 
saw  the  murk  of  the  storm.  "The  lightning  must 
strike  some  time,  you  are  thinking,  eh?"  she  simpered. 


KincaicTs  Battery 

"No,  not  necessarily — thanks  to  your  aid!" 
Thanks  far  more  to  Flora's  subtlety  and  diligence. 
It  refreshed  Madame  to  see  how  well  the  fair  strategist 
kept  her  purposes  hid.  Not  even  Irby  called  them — 
those  he  discerned — hers.  In  any  case,  at  any  time, 
any  possessive  but  my  or  mine,  or  my  or  mine  on  any 
lip  but  his,  angered  him.  Wise  Flora,  whenever  she 
alluded  to  their  holding  of  the  plighted  ones  apart, 
named  the  scheme  his  till  that  cloyed,  and  then  "ours" 
in  a  way  that  made  it  more  richly  his,  even  when — 
clearly  to  Madame,  dimly  to  him,  exasperatingly  to 
both — her  wiles  for  its  success — woven  around  his 
cousin — became  purely  feminine  blandishments  for 
purely  feminine  ends.  In  her  own  mind  she  accorded 
Irby  only  the  same  partnership  of  aims  which  she  con 
temptuously  shared  with  the  grandam,  who,  like  Irby, 
still  harped  on  assets,  on  that  estate  over  in  Louisiana 
which  every  one  else,  save  his  uncle,  had  all  but  for 
gotten.  The  plantation  and  its  slaves  were  still  Irby's 
objective,  and  though  Flora  was  no  less  so,  any  chance 
that  for  jealousy  of  her  and  Hilary  he  might  throw 
Anna  into  Hilary's  arms,  was  offset  by  his  evident  con 
viction  that  the  estate  would  in  that  moment  be  lost 
to  him  and  that  no  estate  meant  no  Flora.  Madame 
kept  that  before  him  and  he  thanked  and  loathed  her 
accordingly. 

Flora's  subtlety  and  diligence,  yes,  indeed.  By 
skill  in  phrases  and  silences,  by  truth  misshapen,  by 
flatteries  daintily  fitted,  artfully  distributed,  never  over 
done;  by  a  certain  slow,  basal  co-operation  from  Irby 
(his  getting  Mandeville  sent  out  by  Pemberton  with 
secret  despatches  to  Johnston,  for  example),  by  a  deft 

316 


Arachne 

touch  now  and  then  from  Madame,  by  this  fine  perti 
nacity  of  luck,  and  by  a  sweet  new  charity  of  speech 
and  her  kindness  of  ministration  on  every  side,  the  pret 
ty  schemer  had  everybody  blundering  into  her  hand, 
even  to  the  extent  of  keeping  the  three  Callenders  con 
vinced  that  Kincaid's  Battery  had  been  cut  off  at  Big 
Black  Bridge  and  had  gone,  after  all,  to  Mobile.  No 
wonder  she  inwardly  trembled. 

And  there  was  yet  another  reason:  since  coming 
into  Vicksburg,  all  unaware  yet  why  Anna  so  inordi 
nately  prized  the  old  dagger,  she  had  told  her  where 
it  still  lay  hid  in  Callender  House.  To  a  battery  lad 
who  had  been  there  on  the  night  of  the  weapon's  dis 
appearance  and  who  had  died  in  her  arms  at  Cham 
pion's  Hill,  she  had  imputed  a  confession  that,  having 
found  the  moving  panel,  a  soldier  boy's  pure  wanton 
ness  had  prompted  him  to  the  act  which,  in  fact,  only 
she  had  committed.  So  she  had  set  Anna's  whole 
soul  upon  getting  back  to  New  Orleans  to  regain  the 
trinket-treasure  and  somehow  get  out  with  it  to  Mobile, 
imperiled  Mobile,  where  now,  if  on  earth  anywhere, 
her  hope  was  to  find  Hilary  Kincaid. 

Does  it  not  tax  all  patience,  that  no  better  intuition 
of  heart,  no  frenzy  of  true  love  in  either  Hilary  or 
Anna — suffering  the  frenzies  they  did — should  have 
taught  them  to  rend  the  poor  web  that  held  them  separ 
ate  almost  within  the  sound  of  each  other's  cry?  No, 
not  when  we  consider  other  sounds,  surrounding  con 
ditions:  miles  and  miles  of  riflemen  and  gunners  in 
so  constant  a  whirlwind  of  destruction  and  anguish 
that  men  like  Maxime  Lafontaine  and  Sam  Gibbs 
went  into  open  hysterics  at  their  guns,  and  even  while 


KincaicTs  Battery 

sleeping  on  their  arms,  under  humming  bullets  and 
crashing  shells  and  over  mines  ready  to  be  sprung, 
sobbed  and  shivered  like  babes,  aware  in  their  slum 
bers  that  they  might  "die  before  they  waked."  In 
the  town  unearthly  howlings  and  volcanic  thunders, 
close  overhead,  cried  havoc  in  every  street,  at  every 
cave  door.  There  Anna,  in  low  daily  fevers,  with  her 
"heart  in  New  Orleans,"  had  to  be  "kept  quiet" 
by  Miranda  and  Constance,  the  latter  as  widowed 
as  Anna,  wondering  whether  "Steve  was  alive  or 
not." 

This  is  a  history  of  hearts.  Yet,  time  flying  as  it  does, 
the  wild  fightings  even  in  those  hearts,  the  famishing, 
down -breaking  sieges  in  them,  must  largely  be  left 
untold — Hilary's,  Anna's,  Flora's,  all.  Kincaid  was 
in  greater  temptation  than  he  knew.  Many  a  battery 
boy,  sick,  sound  or  wounded — Charlie  for  one — saw 
it  more  plainly  than  he.  Anna,  supposed  to  be  far 
away  and  away  by  choice,  was  still  under  the  whole 
command's  impeachment,  while  Flora,  amid  conditions 
that  gave  every  week  the  passional  value  of  a  peace 
time  year,  was  here  at  hand,  an  ever-ministering  angel 
to  them  and  to  their  hero;  yet  they  never  included  him 
and  Flora  in  one  thought  together  but  to  banish  it, 
though  with  tender  reverence.  Behind  a  labored  dis 
guise  of  inattention  they  jealously  watched  lest  the 
faintest  blight  or  languor  should  mar,  in  him,  the  per 
fect  bloom  of  that  invincible  faith  to,  and  faith  in, 
the  faithless  Anna,  which  alone  could  satisfy  their 
worship  of  him.  Care  for  these  watchers  brought  the 
two  much  together,  and  in  every  private  moment  they 
talked  of  the  third  one;  Flora  still  fine  in  the  role  of 


Arachne 

Anna's  devotee  and  Hilary's  "pilot,"  rich  in  long- 
thought-out  fabrications,  but  giving  forth  only  what 
was  wrung  from  her  and  parting  with  each  word  as  if  it 
cost  her  a  pang.  Starving  and  sickening,  fighting  and 
falling,  the  haggard  boys  watched;  yet  so  faultless  was 
the  maiden's  art  that  when  in  a  fury  of  affright  at  the 
risks  of  time  she  one  day  forced  their  commander  to 
see  her  heart's  starvation  for  him  the  battery  saw 
nothing,  and  even  to  him  she  yet  appeared  faultless  in 
modesty  and  utterly,  marvelously,  splendidly  ignorant 
of  what  she  had  done. 

"Guide  right!"  he  mused  alone.  "At  last,  H.  K., 
your  nickname's  got  a  meaning  worth  living  up  to!" 

While  he  mused,  Flora,  enraged  both  for  him  and 
against  him,  and  with  the  rage  burning  in  her  eye 
and  on  her  brow,  stood  before  her  seated  grandmother, 
mutely  giving  gaze  for  gaze  until  the  elder  knew. 

The  old  woman  resumed  her  needle.  "And  all  you 
have  for  it,"  was  the  first  word,  "is  his  pity,  eh?" 

"Wait!"  murmured  the  girl.  "I  will  win  yet,  if  I 
have  to  lose " 

"Yes?"  skeptically  simpered  the  grandam,  " — have 
to  lose  yourself  to  do  it  ?" 

The  two  gazed  again  until  the  maiden  quietly  nodded 
and  her  senior  sprang  half  up: 

"No,  no!  ah,  no-no-no!  There's  a  crime  awaiting 
you,  but  not  that!  Oh,  no,  you  are  no  such  fool!" 

"No?"  The  girl  came  near,  bent  low  and  with 
dancing  eyes  said,  "I'll  be  fool  enough  to  lead  him  on 
till  his  sense  of  honor " 

"Sense  of— oh,  ho,  ho!" 

"Sense  of  his  honor  and  mine — will  make  him  my 


KincaicTs  Battery 

prisoner.  Or  else—!"  The  speaker's  eyes  burned. 
Her  bosom  rose  and  fell. 

"Yes,"  said  the  seated  one — to  her  needle — "or 
else  his  sense  that  Charlie — My  God!  don't  pinch  my 
ear  off!" 

"Happy  thought,"  laughed  Flora,  letting  go,  "but 
a  very  poor  guess." 


LIX 

IN    A    LABYRINTH 

FOR  ladies'  funerals,  we  say,  mortars  and  siege- 
guns,  as  a  rule,  do  not  pause.  But  here  at  Vicksburg 
there  was  an  hour  near  the  end  of  each  day  when  the 
foe,  for  some  mercy  to  themselves,  ceased  to  bombard, 
and  in  one  of  these  respites  that  procession  ventured 
forth  in  which  rode  the  fevered  Anna:  a  farm  wagon, 
a  battered  family  coach,  a  carryall  or  two. 

Yet  in  the  midst  of  the  graveyard  rites  there  broke 
out  on  the  unseen  lines  near  by,  northward,  an  uproar 
of  attack,  and  one  or  two  shells  burst  in  plain  view, 
frightening  the  teams.  The  company  leaped  into  the 
vehicles  any  way  they  could  and  started  townward 
over  a  miserable  road  with  the  contest  resounding  on 
their  right.  As  they  jostled  along  the  edge  of  a  wood 
that  lay  between  them  and  the  firing  some  mishap  to  the 
front  team  caused  all  to  alight,  whereupon  a  shell, 
faultily  timed,  came  tearing  through  the  tree-tops  and 
exploded  in  the  remains  of  a  fence  close  beyond  them. 
Amid  thunder,  smoke,  and  brute  and  human  terror 
the  remounting  groups  whirled  away  and  had  en- 

320 


In  a  Labyrinth 

tirely  left  the  scene  before  that  was  asked  which  none 
could  tell:   Where  was  Anna? 

Anna  herself  did  not  know,  could  not  inquire  of 
her  own  mind.  With  a  consciousness  wholly  disem 
bodied  she  was  mainly  aware  of  a  great  pain  that 
seemed  to  fill  all  the  region  and  atmosphere,  an  at 
mosphere  charged  with  mysterious  dim  green  light  and 
full  of  great  boomings  amid  a  crackle  of  smaller  ones; 
of  shouts  and  cheers  and  of  a  placid  quaking  of  myriad 
leaves;  all  of  which  things  might  be  things  or  only 
divers  manifestations  of  her  undefmable  self. 

By  and  by  through  the  pain  came  a  dream  of  some 
one  like  her  living  in  a  certain  heaven  of  comfort  and 
beauty,  peace,  joy,  and  love  named  "  Callender  House" ; 
but  the  pain  persisted  and  the  dream  passed  into  a 
horrible  daytime  darkness  that  brought  a  sense  of 
vast  changes  near  and  far;  a  sense  of  many  having 
gone  from  that  house,  and  of  many  having  most  for- 
biddenly  come  to  it;  a  sense  of  herself  spending  years 
and  years,  and  passing  from  world  to  world,  in  quest  of 
one  Hilary,  Hilary  Kincaid,  whom  all  others  believed 
to  be  dead  or  false,  or  both,  but  who  would  and  should 
and  must  be  found,  and  when  found  would  be  alive 
and  hale  and  true;  a  sense  of  having,  with  companions, 
been  all  at  once  frightfully  close  to  a  rending  of  the 
sky,  and  of  having  tripped  as  she  fled,  of  having  fallen 
and  lain  in  a  thunderous  storm  of  invisible  hail,  and 
of  having  after  a  time  risen  again  and  staggered  on,  an 
incalculable  distance,  among  countless  growing  things, 
fleeing  down-hill,  too  weak  to  turn  up-hill,  till  sud 
denly  the  whole  world  seemed  to  strike  hard  against 
something  that  sent  it  reeling  backward. 

321 


Kincaid's  Battery 

And  now  her  senses  began  feebly  to  regather  within 
truer  limits  and  to  tell  her  she  was  lying  on  the  rooty 
ground  of  a  thicket.  Dimly  she  thought  to  be  up  and 
gone  once  more,  but  could  get  no  farther  than  the 
thought  although  behind  her  closed  lids  glimmered 
a  memory  of  deadly  combat.  Its  din  had  passed, 
but  there  still  sounded,  just  beyond  this  covert,  fierce 
commands  of  new  preparation,  and  hurried  movements 
in  response — a  sending  and  bringing,  dismissing,  and 
summoning  of  men  and  things  to  rear  or  front,  left  or 
right,  in  a  fury  of  supply  and  demand. 

Ah,  what!  water?  in  her  face?  Her  eyes  opened 
wildly.  A  man  was  kneeling  beside  her.  He  held  a 
canteen;  an  armed  officer  in  the  foe's  blue.  With 
lips  parting  to  cry  out  she  strove  to  rise  and  fly,  but  his 
silent  beseechings  showed  him  too  badly  hurt  below 
the  knees  to  offer  aid  or  hindrance,  and  as  she  gained 
her  feet  she  let  him  plead  with  stifled  eagerness  for 
her  succor  from  risks  of  a  captivity  which,  in  starving 
Vicksburg  and  in  such  plight,  would  be  death. 

He  was  a  stranger  and  an  enemy,  whose  hurried 
speech  was  stealthy  and  whose  eyes  went  spying  here 
and  there,  but  so  might  it  be  just  then  somewhere 
with  him  for  whom  she  yet  clung  to  life.  For  that  one's 
sake,  and  more  than  half  in  dream,  she  gave  the  sufferer 
her  support,  and  with  a  brow  knit  in  anguish,  but  with 
the  fire  of  battle  still  in  his  wasting  blood,  he  rose,  fit 
fully  explaining  the  conditions  of  the  place  and  hour. 
To  cover  a  withdrawal  of  artillery  from  an  outer  to 
an  inner  work  a  gray  line  had  unexpectedly  charged, 
and  as  it  fell  back  with  its  guns,  hotly  pressed,  a  part 
of  the  fight  had  swung  down  into  and  half  across  this  ra- 

322 


In  a  Labyrinth 

vine,  for  which  another  struggle  was  furiously  preparing 
on  both  sides,  but  which,  for  him,  in  the  interval,  was 
an  open  way  of  deliverance  if  she  would  be  his  crutch. 

In  equal  bewilderment  of  thought  and  of  outer 
sense,  pleadingly  assured  that  she  would  at  once  be 
sent  back  under  flag  of  truce,  with  compassion  deep 
ening  to  compulsion  and  with  a  vague  inkling  that, 
failing  the  white  flag,  this  might  be  heaven's  leading 
back  to  Callender  House  and  the  jewel  treasure,  to 
Mobile  and  to  Hilary,  she  gave  her  aid.  Beyond  the 
thicket  the  way  continued  tangled,  rough  and  dim. 
Twice  and  again  the  stricken  man  paused  for  breath 
and  ease  from  torture,  though  the  sounds  of  array, 
now  on  two  sides,  threatened  at  every  step  to  become 
the  cry  of  onset.  Presently  he  stopped  once  more, 
heaved,  swayed  and,  despite  her  clutch,  sank  heavily 
to  the  ground. 

"Water!"  he  gasped,  but  before  she  could  touch  the 
canteen  to  his  lips  he  had  fainted.  She  sprinkled  his 
face,  but  he  did  not  stir.  She  gazed,  striving  for  clear 
thought,  and  then  sprang  up  and  called.  What  word  ? 
Ah,  what  in  all  speech  should  she  call  but  a  name, 
the  name  of  him  whose  warrant  of  marriage  lay  at 
that  moment  in  her  bosom,  the  name  of  him  who  be 
fore  God  and  the  world  had  sworn  her  his  mated,  life 
long  protection? 

"  Hilary  1"  she  wailed,  and  as  the  echoes  of  the  green 
wood  died,  " Hilary!"  again.  On  one  side  there  was 
more  light  in  the  verdure  than  elsewhere  and  that  way 
she  called.  That  way  she  moved  stumblingly  and 
near  the  edge  of  a  small  clear  space  cried  once  more, 
"Hilary!  .  .  .  Hilary!" 

323 


Kincaid's  Battery 
LX 


FAINTLY  the  bearer  of  that  name  heard  the  call; 
heard  it  rise  from  a  quarter  fearfully  nearer  the  foe's 
line  than  to  his;  caught  it  with  his  trained  ear  as,  just 
beyond  sight  of  Irby,  Miranda,  and  others,  he  stood 
in  amazed  converse  with  Flora  Valcour.  Fortune, 
smiling  on  Flora  yet,  had  brought  first  to  her  the  terri 
fied  funeral  group  and  so  had  enabled  her  to  bear  to 
Hilary  the  news  of  the  strange  estrayal,  skilfully 
blended  with  that  revelation  of  Anna's  Vicksburg 
sojourn  which  she,  Flora,  had  kept  from  him  so  cleverly 
and  so  long. 

With  mingled  rapture  and  distress,  with  a  heart 
standing  as  still  as  his  feet,  as  still  as  his  lifted  head 
and  shining  eyes,  he  listened  and  heard  again.  Swiftly, 
though  not  with  the  speed  he  would  have  chosen,  he 
sprang  toward  the  call;  sped  softly  through  the  brush, 
softly  and  without  voice,  lest  he  draw  the  enemy's 
fire;  softly  and  mutely,  with  futile  backward  wavings 
and  frowning  and  imploring  whispers  to  Flora  as  in 
a  dishevelled  glow  that  doubled  her  beauty  she  glided 
after  him. 

Strangely,  amid  a  swarm  of  keen  perceptions  that 
plagued  him  like  a  cloud  of  arrows  as  he  ran,  that 
beauty  smote  his  conscience;  her  beauty  and  the  wor 
ship  and  protection  it  deserved  from  all  manhood  and 
most  of  all  from  him,  whose  unhappy,  unwitting  fortune 
it  was  to  have  ensnared  her  young  heart  and  brought 
it  to  the  desperation  of  an  unnatural  self-revealment; 

324 


Hilary's  Ghost 

her  uncoveted  beauty,  uncourted  love,  unwelcome 
presence,  and  hideous  peril !  Was  he  not  to  all  these  in 
simplest  honor  peculiarly  accountable?  They  lanced 
him  through  with  arraignment  as,  still  waving  her  be 
seechingly,  commandingly  back,  with  weapons  un 
drawn  the  more  swiftly  to  part  the  way  before  him, 
his  frenzy  for  Anna  drew  him  on,  as  full  of  introspection 
as  a  drowning  man,  thinking  a  year's  thoughts  at  every 
step.  Oh,  mad  joy  in  pitiful  employment!  Here 
while  the  millions  of  a  continent  waged  heroic  war 
for  great  wrongs  and  rights,  here  on  the  fighting-line 
of  a  beleaguered  and  starving  city,  here  when  at  any 
instant  the  peal  of  his  own  guns  might  sound  a  fresh 
onset,  behold  him  in  a  lover's  part,  loving  "not  honor 
more,"  setting  the  seal  upon  his  painful  alias,  filching 
time  out  of  the  jaws  of  death  to  pursue  one  maiden 
while  clung  to  by  another.  Oh,  Anna !  Anna  Callender ! 
my  life  for  my  country,  but  this  moment  for  thy  life 
and  thee!  God  stay  the  onslaught  this  one  moment! 

As  he  reached  the  edge  of  that  narrow  opening 
from  whose  farther  side  Anna  had  called  he  halted, 
glanced  furtively  about,  and  harkened  forward,  back 
ward,  through  leafy  distances  grown  ominously  still. 
Oh,  why  did  the  call  not  come  again?  Hardly  in  a 
burning  house  could  time  be  half  so  priceless.  Not  a 
breath  could  promise  that  in  the  next  the  lightnings, 
thunders,  and  long  human  yell  of  assault  would  not 
rend  the  air.  Flora's  soft  tread  ceased  at  his  side. 

"Stay  back!"  he  fiercely  breathed,  and  pointed 
just  ahead:  "'The  enemy's  skirmishers!" 

"Come  away!"  she  piteously  whispered,  trembling 
with  terror.  For,  by  a  glimpse  as  brief  as  the  catch 

325 


KincaicTs  Battery 

of  her  breath,  yonder  a  mere  rod  or  so  within  the  farther 
foliage,  down  a  vista  hardly  wider  than  a  man's  shoul 
ders,  an  armed  man's  blue  shoulders  she  had  seen, 
under  his  black  hat  and  peering  countenance.  Joy 
filled  the  depth  of  her  heart  in  the  belief  that  a  thin 
line  of  such  black  hats  had  already  put  Anna  behind 
them,  yet  she  quaked  in  terror,  terror  of  death,  of 
instant,  shot-torn  death  that  might  leave  Hilary  Kin- 
caid  alive. 

With  smiting  pity  he  saw  her  affright.  "Go  back!" 
he  once  more  gasped:  "In  God's  name,  go  back!" 
while  recklessly  he  stepped  forward  out  of  cover. 
But  in  splendid  desperation,  with  all  her  soul's  battle 
in  her  eyes — horror,  love,  defiance,  and  rending  chagrin 
striving  and  smiting,  she  sprang  after  him  into  the 
open,  and  clutched  and  twined  his  arms.  The  blue 
skirmish-line,  without  hearing,  saw  him;  saw,  and 
withheld  their  fire,  fiercely  glad  that  tactics  and  mercy 
should  for  once  agree.  And  Anna  saw. 

"Come  with  me  back!"  whispered  Flora,  dragging 
on  him  with  bending  knees.  "She's  lost!  She's  gone 
back  to  those  Yankee,  and  to  Fred  Greenleaf!  And 
you" — the  whisper  rose  to  a  murmur  whose  pathos 
grew  with  her  Creole  accent — "you,  another  step 
and  you  are  a  deserter!  Yes!  to  your  country — to 
Kincaid'  Batt'ree — to  me-me-me!"  The  soft  torrent 
of  speech  grew  audible  beyond  them:  "Oh,  my  God! 
Hilary  Kincaid,  listen-to-me-listen !  You  'ave  no 
right;  no  ri-ight  to  leave  me!  Ah,  you  shall  not!  No 
right — ri-ight  to  leave  yo'  Flora — sinze  she's  toP  you 
— sinze  she's  toP  you — w'at  she's  toP  you!" 

In  this  long  history  of  a  moment  the  blue  skirmish- 
326 


"  You  'ave  no  ri-ight  to  leave  me!     Ah,  you  shall  not!  " 


Hilary's  Ghost 

ers  had  not  yet  found  Anna,  but  it  was  their  advance, 
their  soft  stir  at  her  back  as  they  came  upon  their 
fallen  leader,  that  had  hushed  her  cries.  At  the  rift 
in  the  wood  she  had  leaned  on  a  huge  oak  and  as  body 
and  mind  again  failed  had  sunk  to  its  base  in  leafy 
hiding.  Vaguely  thence  she  presently  perceived,  lit 
from  behind  her  by  sunset  beams,  the  farther  edge  of 
the  green  opening,  and  on  that  border,  while  she  feebly 
looked,  came  suddenly  a  ghost! 

Ah,  Heaven!  the  ghost  of  Hilary  Kincaid!  It  looked 
about  for  her!  It  listened  for  her  call!  By  the  tree's 
rough  bark  she  drew  up  half  her  height,  clung  and, 
with  reeling  brain,  gazed.  How  tall!  how  gaunt!  how 
dingy  gray!  How  unlike  her  whilom  " ladies'  man," 
whom,  doubtless  truly,  they  now  called  dead  and  buried. 
But  what — what — was  troubling  the  poor  ghost? 
What  did  it  so  wildly  avoid?  what  wave  away  with 
such  loving,  tender  pain?  Flora  Valcour!  Oh,  see, 
see !  Ah,  death  in  life !  what  does  she  see  ?  As  by  the 
glare  of  a  bursting  midnight  shell  all  the  empty  gossip 
of  two  years  justified — made  real — in  one  flash  of 
staring  view.  With  a  long  moan  the  beholder  cast 
her  arms  aloft  and  sank  in  a  heap,  not  knowing  that 
the  act  had  caught  Hilary's  eye,  but  willingly  aware 
that  her  voice  had  perished  in  a  roar  of  artillery  from 
the  farther  brink  of  the  ravine,  in  a  crackle  and  fall  of 
tree-tops,  and  in  the  "rebel  yell"  and  charge. 

Next  morning,  in  a  fog,  the  blue  holders  of  a  new 
line  of  rifle-pits  close  under  the  top  of  a  bluff  talked 
up  to  the  grays  in  a  trench  on  its  crest.  Gross  was 
the  banter,  but  at  mention  of  "ladies"  it  purified. 

"  Johnnie !"  cried  "  Yank,"  "  who  is  she,  the  one  we've 

327 


Kincaid's  Battery 

got?"  and  when  told  to  ask  her,  said  she  was  too  ill  to 
ask.  By  and  by  to  ''Johnnie's"  inquiries  the  blues 
replied : 

* '  He  ?  the  giant  ?  Hurt  ?  No-o,  not  half  bad  enough, 
when  we  count  what  he  cost  us.  If  we'd  known  he 
was  only  stunned  we" — and  so  on,  not  very  interest 
ingly,  while  back  in  the  rear  of  the  gray  line  tearful 
Constance  praised,  to  her  face,  the  haggard  Flora 
and,  in  his  absence,  the  wounded  Irby,  Flora's  splendid 
rescuer  in  the  evening  onslaught. 

"A  lifetime  debt,"  Miranda  thought  Flora  owed 
him,  and  Flora's  meditative  yes,  as  she  lifted  her  eyes 
to  her  grandmother's,  was — peculiar. 

A  few  days  later  Anna,  waking  in  the  bliss  of  a  re 
stored  mind,  and  feeling  beneath  her  a  tremor  of  paddle- 
wheels,  gazed  on  the  nurse  at  her  side. 

"Am  I  a — prisoner?"  she  asked. 

The  woman  bent  kindly  without  reply. 

"Anyhow,"  said  Anna,  with  a  one-sided  smile, 
"they  can't  call  me  a  spy."  Her  words  quickened: 
"I'm  a  rebel,  but  I'm  no  spy.  I  was  lost.  And  he's 
no  spy.  He  was  in  uniform.  Is  he — on  this  boat?" 

Yes,  she  was  told,  he  was,  with  a  few  others  like 
him,  taken  too  soon  for  the  general  parole  of  the  sur 
render.  Parole?  she  pondered.  Surrender?  What 
surrender?  "Where  are  we  going?"  she  softly  in 
quired;  "not  to  New  Orleans?" 

The  nurse  nodded  brightly. 

"But  how  can  we  get — by?" 

"By  Vicksburg?    We're  already  by  there." 

"Has  Vicks— ?  ...  Has  Vicksburg— fallen ?" 

The  confirming  nod  was  tender.  Anna  turned 
328 


The  Flag-of-Truce  Boat 

away.     Presently — "But   not    Mobile?    Mobile    has 
n't ? 

"No,  not  yet.     But  it  must,  don't  you  think?" 
"No!"  cried  Anna.     "It  must  not!    Oh,  it  must 

not!    I— if  I— Oh,  if  I " 

The  nurse  soothed  her  smilingly:  "My  poor  child," 
she  said,  "you  can't  save  Mobile." 


LXI 

THE   FLAG-OF-TRUCE   BOAT 

SEPTEMBER  was  in  its  first  week.  The  news  of 
Vicksburg — and  Port  Hudson — ah,  yes,  and  Gettys 
burg! — was  sixty  days  old. 

From  Southern  Mississippi  and  East  Louisiana 
all  the  grays  who  marched  under  the  slanting  bayonet 
or  beside  the  cannon's  wheel  were  gone.  Left  were 
only  the  "  citizen "  with  his  family  and  slaves,  the  post 
quartermaster  and  commissary,  the  conscript-officer, 
the  trading  Jew,  the  tax-in-kind  collector,  the  hiding 
deserter,  the  jayhawker,  a  few  wounded  boys  on  fur 
lough,  and  Harper's  cavalry.  Throughout  the  Delta 
and  widely  about  its  grief-broken,  discrowned,  beggared, 
shame-crazed,  brow-beaten  Crescent  City  the  giddying 
heat  quaked  visibly  over  the  high  corn,  cotton,  and  cane, 
up  and  down  the  broken  levees  and  ruined  highways, 
empty  byways,  and  grass-grown  railways,  on  charred 
bridges,  felled  groves,  and  long  burnt  fence  lines.  The 
deep,  moss-draped,  vine-tangled  swamps  were  dry. 

So  quivered  the  same  heat  in  the  city's  empty  thor 
oughfares.  Flowers  rioted  in  the  unkept  gardens.  The 

329 


Kincaid's  Battery 

cicada's  frying  note  fried  hotter  than  ever.  Dazzling 
thunder-heads  towered  in  the  upper  blue  and  stood 
like  snow  mountains  of  a  vaster  world.  The  very 
snake  coiled  in  the  shade.  The  spiced  air  gathered 
no  freshness  from  the  furious,  infrequent  showers,  the 
pavements  burned  the  feet,  and  the  blue  "Yank" 
(whom  there  no  one  dared  call  so  by  word  or  look), 
so  stoutly  clad,  so  uncouthly  misfitted,  slept  at  noon 
face  downward  in  the  high  grass  under  the  trees  of  the 
public  squares  preempted  by  his  tents,  or  with  piece 
loaded  and  bayonet  fixed  slowly  paced  to  and  fro  in 
the  scant  shade  of  some  confiscated  office-building, 
from  whose  upper  windows  gray  captives  looked  down, 
one  of  them  being  "the  ladies'  man." 

Not  known  of  his  keepers  by  that  name,  though  as 
the  famous  Major  Kincaid  of  Kincaid's  Battery  (the 
latter  at  Mobile  with  new  guns),  all  July  and  August 
he  had  been  of  those  who  looked  down  from  such 
windows;  looked  down  often  and  long,  yet  never 
descried  one  rippling  fold  of  one  gossamer  flounce  of 
a  single  specimen  of  those  far-compassionated  "ladies 
of  New  Orleans,"  one  of  whom,  all  that  same  time, 
was  Anna  Callender.  No  proved  spy,  she,  no  incar 
cerated  prisoner,  yet  the  most  gravely  warned,  though 
gentlest,  suspect  in  all  the  recalcitrant  city. 

Neither  in  those  sixty  days  had  Anna  seen  him. 
The  blue  sentries  let  no  one  pass  in  sight  of  that  sort 
of  windows.  "Permit?"  She  had  not  sought  it. 
Some  one  in  gold  lace  called  her  "blamed  lucky"  to 
enjoy  the  ordinary  permissions  accorded  Tom,  Dick, 
and  Harry.  Indeed  Tom,  Dick,  and  Harry  were  freer 
than  she.  By  reason  of  hints  caught  from  her  in 

33° 


The  Flag-of-Truce  Boat 

wanderings  of  her  mind  on  the  boat,  in  dreams  of  a 
great  service  to  be  done  for  Dixie,  the  one  spot  where 
she  most  yearned  to  go  and  to  be  was  forbidden  her, 
and  not  yet  had  she  been  allowed  to  rest  her  hungry 
eyes  on  Callender  House.  Worse  than  idle,  therefore, 
perilous  for  both  of  them  and  for  any  dream  of  great 
service,  would  it  have  been  even  to  name  the  name 
of  Hilary  Kincaid. 

What  torture  the  double  ban,  the  two  interlocked 
privations !  Yonder  a  city,  little  sister  of  New  Orleans, 
still  mutely  hoping  to  be  saved,  here  Hilary  alive  again, 
though  Anna  still  unwitting  whether  she  should  love 
and  live  or  doubt  and  die.  Yet  what  would  they  say 
when  they  should  meet?  How  could  either  explain? 
Surely,  we  think,  love  would  have  found  a  way;  but 
while  beyond  each  other's  sight  and  hearing,  no  way 
could  Hilary,  at  least,  descry. 

To  him  it  seemed  impossible  to  speak  to  her — even 
to  Fred  Greenleaf  had  Fred  been  there! — without  be 
traying  another  maiden,  one  who  had  sealed  his  lips 
forever  by  confessing  a  heart  which  had  as  much — 
had  more  right  to  love  than  he  to  live.  True,  Anna, 
above  all,  had  right  to  live,  to  love,  to  know;  but  in 
simplest  honor  to  commonest  manhood,  in  simplest 
manhood's  honor  to  all  womankind,  to  Flora,  to  Anna 
herself,  this  knowledge  should  come  from  any  other 
human  tongue  rather  than  from  his.  From  Anna  he 
needed  no  explanation.  That  most  mysteriously  she 
should  twice  have  defaulted  as  keeper  of  sacred  treasure; 
that  she  stood  long  accused,  by  those  who  would  most 
gladly  have  scouted  the  charge,  of  leanings  to  another 
suitor,  a  suitor  in  the  blue,  and  of  sympathies,  nay, 


KincaicTs  Battery 

services,  treasonous  to  the  ragged  standards  of  the 
gray;  that  he  had  himself  found  her  in  the  enemy's 
lines,  carried  there  by  her  own  steps,  and  accepting 
captivity  without  a  murmur,  ah,  what  were  such  light- 
as-air  trials  of  true  love's  faith  while  she  was  still  Anna 
Callender,  that  Anna  from  whom  one  breath  saying, 
"I  am  true,"  would  outweigh  all  a  world  could  show 
or  surmise  in  accusation? 

And  Anna:  What  could  she  say  after  what  she  had 
seen?  Could  she  tell  him — with  Flora,  as  it  were, 
still  in  his  arms — could  she  explain  that  she  had  been 
seeking  him  to  cast  herself  there?  Or  if  she  stood 
mute  until  he  should  speak,  what  could  he  say  to  count 
one  heart-throb  against  what  she  had  seen?  Oh,  be 
fore  God!  before  God!  it  was  not  jealousy  that  could 
make  her  dumb  or  deaf  to  either  of  them.  She  con 
fessed  its  pangs.  Yes!  yes!  against  both  of  them, 
when  she  remembered  certain  things  or  forgot  this 
and  that,  it  raged  in  her  heart,  tingled  in  the  farthest 
reach  of  her  starved  and  fever-dried  veins.  Yet  to 
God  himself,  to  whom  alone  she  told  it,  to  God  him 
self  she  protested  on  her  knees  it  did  not,  should  not, 
could  not  rule  her.  What  right  had  she  to  give  it 
room?  Had  she  not  discerned  from  the  beginning 
that  those  two  were  each  other's  by  natural  destiny? 
Was  it  not  well,  was  it  not  God-sent  to  all  three,  that 
in  due  time,  before  too  late,  he  and  she — that  other, 
resplendent  she — should  be  tried  upon  each  other  alone 
— together?  Always  hitherto  she,  Anna,  had  in  some 
way,  some  degree,  intervened,  by  some  chance  been 
thrust  and  held  between  them;  but  at  length  nature, 
destiny,  had  all  but  prevailed,  when  once  more  she — 

332 


The  Flag-of-Truce  Boat 

stubbornly  astray  from  that  far  mission  of  a  city's 
rescue  so  plainly  hers — had  crashed  in  between  to  the 
shame  and  woe  of  all,  to  the  gain  of  no  cause,  no  soul, 
no  sweet  influence  in  all  love's  universe.  Now,  meet 
ing  Hilary,  what  might  she  do  or  say  ? 

One  thing!  Bid  him,  on  exchange  or  escape — if 
Heaven  should  grant  the  latter — find  again  Flora, 
and  in  her  companionship,  at  last  unhindered,  choose! 
Yes,  that  would  be  justice  and  wisdom,  mercy  and  true 
love,  all  in  one.  But  could  she  do  it,  say  it?  She 
sprang  up  in  bed  to  answer,  "No-o-o!  no,  she  was  no 
bloodless  fool,  she  was  a  woman!  Oh,  God  of  mercy 
and  true  love,  no!  For  reasons  invincible,  no!  but 
most  of  all  for  one  reason,  one  doubt,  vile  jealousy's 
cure  and  despair's  antidote,  slow  to  take  form  but 
growing  as  her  strength  revived,  clear  at  last  and  all- 
sufficing;  a  doubt  infinitely  easier,  simpler,  kinder,  and 
more  blessed  than  to  doubt  true  love.  Nay,  no  doubt, 
but  a  belief!  the  rational,  life-restoring  belief,  that  in 
that  awful  hour  of  twilight  between  the  hosts,  of  twi 
light  and  delirium,  what  she  had  seemed  to  see  she 
had  but  seemed  to  see.  Not  all,  ah,  no,  not  all! 
Hilary  alive  again  and  grappling  with  death  to  come 
at  her  call  had  been  real,  proved  real;  the  rest  a  spectre 
of  her  fevered  brain!  Meeting  him  now — and,  oh,  to 
meet  him  now! — there  should  be  no  questionings  or 
explainings,  but  while  he  poured  forth  a  love  unsullied 
and  unshaken  she,  scarce  harkening,  would  with  battle 
haste  tell  him,  her  life's  commander,  the  one  thing  of 
value,  outvaluing  all  mere  lovers'  love:  The  fact  that 
behind  a  chimney-panel  of  Callender  House,  in  its  old 
trivial  disguise,  lay  yet  that  long-lost  fund  pledged  to 

333 


Kincaid's  Battery 

Mobile's  defense — by  themselves  as  lovers,  by  poor 
war-wasted  Kincaid's  Battery,  and  by  all  its  scattered 
sisters;  the  fund  which  must,  as  nearly  on  the  instant  as 
his  and  her  daring  could  contrive,  be  recovered  and 
borne  thither  for  the  unlocking  of  larger,  fate-com 
pelling  resources  of  deliverance. 

One  day  Victorine  came  to  Anna  with  ecstasy  in 
her  almond  eyes  and  much  news  on  her  lips.  "To 
bigin  small,"  she  said,  Flora  and  her  grandmother  had 
"arrive'  back  ag-ain"  at  dawn  that  morning!  Oddly, 
while  Anna  forced  a  smile,  her  visitor's  eyes  narrowed 
and  her  lips  tightened.  So  they  sat,  Anna's  smile 
fading  out  while  her  soul's  troubles  inwardly  burned 
afresh,  Victorine's  look  growing  into  clearer  English 
than  her  Creole  tongue  could  have  spoken.  "I  trust 
her  no  more,"  it  said.  "Long  have  I  doubted  her, 
and  should  have  told  you  sooner  but  for — Charlie; 
but  now,  dead  in  love  as  you  know  me  still  to  be,  you 
have  my  conviction.  That  is  all  for  the  present. 
There  is  better  news." 

The  ecstasy  gleamed  again  and  she  gave  her  second 
item.  These  weeks  she  had  been  seeking,  for  herself 
and  a  guardian  aunt,  a  passport  into  the  Confederacy 
and  lo !  here  it  lay  in  her  pretty  hand. 

"  Deztitution ! "  she  joyfully  confessed  to  be  the 
plea  on  which  it  had  been  procured — by  Doctor  Sevier 
through  Colonel — guess ! — "  Grinleaf ! — juz'  riturn' " 
from  service  in  the  field. 

And  how  were  the  destitute  pair  to  go  ? 

Ah!  did  Anna  "rim-emb'r"  a  despatch-boat  of  un 
rivalled  speed  whose  engines  Hilary  Kin ? 

Yes,  ah,  yes! 

334 


The  Flag-of-Truce  Boat 

On  which  she  and  others  had  once ? 

Yes,  yes! 

And  which  had  been  captured  when  the  city  fell? 
That  boat  was  now  lying  off  Callender  House!  Did 
Anna  not  know  that  her  shattered  home,  so  long  merely 
the  headquarters  of  a  blue  brigade,  had  lately  become 
of  large,  though  very  quiet,  importance  as  a  rendezvous 
of  big  generals  who  by  starlight  paced  its  overgrown 
garden  alleys  debating  and  planning  something  of  great 
moment  ?  Doctor  Sevier  had  found  that  out  and  had 
charged  Victorine  to  tell  it  with  all  secrecy  to  the  big 
gest  general  in  Mobile  the  instant  she  should  reach 
there.  For  she  was  to  go  by  that  despatch-boat. 

"Aw-dinner-illy,"  she  said,  a  flag-of-truce  craft 
might  be  any  old  tub  and  would  go  the  short  way, 
from  behind  the  city  and  across  the  lakes,  not  all 
round  by  the  river  and  the  Chandeleur  Islands.  But 
this  time — that  very  morning — a  score  or  so  of  Con 
federate  prisoners  (officers,  for  exchange)  had  been  put 
aboard  that  boat,  bound  for  Mobile.  Plainly  the  whole 
affair  was  but  a  mask  for  reconnaissance,  the  boat, 
swiftest  in  all  the  Gulf,  to  report  back  at  top  speed 
by  way  of  the  lakes.  But! — the  aunt  would  not  go 
at  all!  Never  having  been  a  mile  from  her  door,  she 
was  begging  off  in  a  palsy  of  fright,  and  here  was  the 
niece  with  a  deep  plot — ample  source  of  her  ecstasy 
— a  plot  for  Anna,  duly  disguised,  to  go  in  the  aunt's 
place,  back  to  freedom,  Dixie,  and  the  arms  of  Con 
stance  and  Miranda. 

Anna  trembled.  She  could  lovingly  call  the  fond 
schemer,  over  and  over,  a  brave,  rash,  generous  little 
heroine  and  lay  caresses  on  her  twice  and  again, 

335 


Kincaid's  Battery 

but  to  know  whether  this  was  Heaven's  leading  was 
beyond  her.  She  paced  the  room.  She  clasped  her 
brow.  A  full  half  of  her  own  great  purpose  (great  to 
her  at  least)  seemed  all  at  once  as  good  as  achieved, 
yet  it  was  but  the  second  half,  as  useless  without  the 
first  as  half  a  bridge  on  the  far  side  of  the  flood.  "I 
cannot  go ! "  she  moaned.  For  the  first  half  was  Hilary, 
and  he — she  saw  it  without  asking — was  on  this  cartel 
of  exchange. 

Gently  she  came  and  took  her  rescuer's  hands: 
"Dear  child!  If — if  while  there  was  yet  time — I  had 
only  got  a  certain  word  to — him — you  know?  But, 
ah,  me!  I  keep  it  idle  yet;  a  secret,  Victorine,  a  secret 
worth  our  three  lives!  oh,  three  times  three  hundred 
lives!  Even  now " 

"Give  it  me,  Anna!  Give  it!  Give  it  me,  that 
sick-rate!  I'll  take  it  him!" 

Anna  shook  her  head:  "Ah,  if  you  could — in  time! 
Or  even — even  without  him,  letting  him  go,  if  just  you 
and  I — Come!"  They  walked  to  and  fro  in  embrace: 
"Dear,  our  front  drawing-room,  so  ruined,  you  know, 
by  that  shell,  last  year " 

"Ah,  the  front?  no!  The  behine,  yes,  with  those 
two  hole'  of  the  shell  and  with  thad  beegue  hole  in  the 
floor  where  it  cadge  fiah." 

"Victorine,  I  could  go — with  you — in  that  boat,  if 
only  I  could  be  for  one  minute  in  that  old  empty  front 
room  alone." 

Victorine  halted  and  sadly  tossed  a  hand:  "Ah! 
h-amptee,  yes,  both  the  front  and  the  back — till  yes- 
teh-day!  This  morning,  the  front,  no!  Juz'  sinze 
laz'  week  they  'ave  brick'  up  bitwin  them  cloze  by 

336 


The  Flag-of-Truce  Boat 

that  burned  hole,  to  make  of  the  front  an  office,  and 
now  the  front  't  is  o'cupy!" 

"Oh,  not  as  an  office,  I  hope?" 

"Worse!  The  worse  that  can  be!  They  'ave 
stop'  five  prisoner'  from  the  boat  and  put  them  yondeh. 
Since  an  hour  Col-on-el  Grinleaf  he  tol'  me  that — 
and  she's  ad  the  bottom,  that  Flora!  Bicause — " 
The  speaker  gazed.  Anna  was  all  joy. 

"Because  what?"  demanded  Anna,  "because 
Hil ?" 

"Yaas!  bicause  he's  one  of  them!  Ringgleadeh! 
I  dunno,  me,  what  is  that,  but  tha'z  what  he's  accuse' 
— ringg-leadingg!" 

Still  the  oblivious  Anna  was  glad.  "It  is  Flora's 
doing,"  she  gratefully  cried.  "She's  done  it!  done 
it  for  us  and  our  cause!" 

"Ah-h!  not  if  she  know  herseff!" 

Anna  laughed  the  discussion  down:  "Come,  dear, 
come!  the  whole  thing  opens  to  me  clear  and 
wide!" 

Not  so  clear  or  wide  as  she  thought.  True,  the 
suffering  Flora  was  doing  this,  in  desperate  haste; 
but  not  for  Anna,  if  she  knew  herself.  Yet  when 
Anna,  in  equal  haste,  made  a  certain  minute,  lengthy 
writing  and,  assisted  by  that  unshaken  devotee, 
her  maid,  and  by  Victorine,  baked  five  small  cakes 
most  laughably  alike  (with  the  writing  in  one) 
and  laid  them  beside  some  plainer  food  in  a  pretty 
basket,  the  way  still  seemed  wide  enough  for  patriot 
ism. 

Now  if  some  one  would  but  grant  Victorine  leave 
to  bestow  this  basket!  As  she  left  Anna  she  gave  her 

337 


Kincaid's  Battery 

pledge  to  seek  this  favor  of  any  one  else  rather  than  of 
Greenleaf;  which  pledge  she  promptly  broke,  with  a 
success  that  fully  reassured  her  cheerful  conscience. 

LXII 

FAREWELL,  JANE! 

"HAPPIEST  man  in  New  Orleans!" 

So  called  himself,  to  Colonel  Greenleaf,  the  large, 
dingy-gray,  lively-eyed  Major  Kincaid,  at  the  sentinelled 
door  of  the  room  where  he  and  his  four  wan  fellows, 
snatched  back  from  liberty  on  the  eve  of  release,  were 
prisoners  in  plain  view  of  the  vessel  on  which  they  were 
to  have  gone  free. 

With  kind  dignity  Greenleaf  predicted  their  un 
doubted  return  to  the  craft  next  morning.  Strange 
was  the  difference  between  this  scene  and  the  one  in 
which,  eighteen  months  before,  these  two  had  last 
been  together  in  this  room.  The  sentry  there  knew 
the  story  and  enjoyed  it.  In  fact,  most  of  the  blue 
occupants  of  the  despoiled  place  had  a  romantic  feeling, 
however  restrained,  for  each  actor  in  that  earlier  epi 
sode.  Yet  there  was  resentment,  too,  against  Green- 
leaf's  clemencies. 

"Wants?"  said  the  bedless  captive  to  his  old  chum, 
"no,  thank  you,  not  a  want!"  implying,  with  his  eyes, 
that  the  cloud  overhanging  Greenleaf  for  favors  shown 
to — hmm! — certain  others  was  already  dark  enough. 
"We've  parlor  furniture  galore,"  he  laughed,  pointing 
out  a  number  of  discolored  and  broken  articles  that 
had  been  beautiful.  One  was  the  screen  behind 
which  the  crouching  Flora  had  heard  him  tell  the  ruin 

338 


Farewell,  Jane! 

of  her  Mobile  home  and  had  sworn  revenge  on  this  home 
and  on  its  fairest  inmate. 

During  the  evening  the  prisoners  grew  a  bit  noisy, 
in  song;  yet  even  when  their  ditties  were  helped  out  by 
a  rhythmic  clatter  of  boot-heels  and  chair-legs  the  too 
indulgent  Greenleaf  did  not  stop  them.  The  voices 
were  good  and  the  lines  amusing  not  merely  to  the 
guards  here  and  there  but  to  most  of  their  epauleted 
superiors  who,  with  lights  out  for  coolness,  sat  in  tilted 
chairs  on  a  far  corner  of  the  front  veranda  to  catch  the 
river  breeze.  One  lay  was  so  antique  as  to  be  as  good 
as  new: 

"  Our  duck  swallowed  a  snail, 
And  her  eyes  stood  out  with  wonder. 

Our  duck  swallowed  a  snail, 
And  her  eyes  stood  out  with  wonder 
Till  the  horns  grew  out  of  her  tail,  tail,  tail, 

Tail,  Tail, 

Tail,  Tail, 

Tail,  Tail, 

And  tore  it  All  asunder. 

Farewell,  Jane! 

Our  old  horse  fell  into  the  well 

Around  behind  the  stable. 
Our  old  horse  fell  into  the  well 

Around  behind  the  stable. 
He  couldn't  fall  all  the  way  but  he  fell, 
Fell, 
Fell, 
Fell, 
Fell, 
Fell, 
Fell, 

As  far  as  he  was  able. 
Farewell,  Jane!" 

339 


Kincaid's  Battery 

It  is  here  we  may  safest  be  brief.  The  literature 
of  prison  escapes  is  already  full  enough.  Working  in 
the  soft  mortar  of  so  new  a  wall  and  worked  by  one 
with  a  foundryman's  knowledge  of  bricklaying,  the 
murdered  Italian's  stout  old  knife  made  effective  speed 
as  it  kept  neat  time  with  the  racket  maintained  for  it. 
When  the  happiest  man  in  New  Orleans  warily  put 
head  and  shoulders  through  the  low  gap  he  had  opened, 
withdrew  them  again  and  reported  to  his  fellows,  the 
droll  excess  of  their  good  fortune  moved  the  five  to 
livelier  song,  and  as  one  by  one  the  other  four  heads 
went  in  to  view  the  glad  sight  the  five  gave  a  yet  more 
tragic  stanza  from  the  farewell  to  Jane.  The  source 
of  their  delight  was  not  the  great  ragged  hole  just 
over  the  intruding  heads,  in  the  ceiling's  lath  and  plaster, 
nor  was  it  a  whole  corner  torn  off  the  grand-piano  by  the 
somersaulting  shell  as  it  leaped  from  the  rent  above  to 
the  cleaner  one  it  had  left  at  the  baseboard  in  the  room's 
farther  end.  It  was  that  third  hole,  burned  in  the  floor; 
for  there  it  opened,  shoulder  wide,  almost  under  their 
startled  faces,  free  to  the  basement's  floor  and  actually 
with  the  rough  ladder  yet  standing  in  it  which  had 
been  used  in  putting  out  the  fire.  That  such  luck 
could  last  a  night  was  too  much  to  hope. 

Yet  it  lasted.  The  songs  were  hushed.  The  room 
whence  they  had  come  was  without  an  audible  stir. 
Sleep  stole  through  all  the  house,  through  the  small  camp 
of  the  guard  in  the  darkened  grove,  the  farther  tents  of 
the  brigade,  the  anchored  ships,  the  wide  city,  the  star 
lit  landscape.  Out  in  that  rear  garden-path  where 
Madame  Valcour  had  once  been  taken  to  see  the  head- 
high  wealth  of  roses  two  generals,  who  had  been  there 

340 


Farewell,  Jane! 

through  all  the  singing,  still  paced  to  and  fro  and  talked, 
like  old  Brodnax  at  Carrollton  in  that  brighter  time, 
"not  nearly  as  much  alone  as  they  seemed."  One 
by  one  five  men  in  gray,  each,  for  all  his  crouching 
and  gliding,  as  true  and  gallant  a  gentleman  as  either 
of  those  commanders,  stole  from  the  house's  basement 
and  slipped  in  and  out  among  the  roses.  Along  a 
back  fence  a  guard  walked  up  and  down.  Two  by 
two,  when  his  back  was  turned,  went  four  of  the  glid 
ing  men,  as  still  as  bats,  over  the  fence  into  a  city  of 
ten  thousand  welcome  hiding-places.  The  fifth,  their 
"ringg-leadeh,"  for  whom  they  must  wait  concealed 
until  he  should  rejoin  them,  lingered  in  the  roses; 
hovered  so  close  to  the  path  that  he  might  have  touched 
its  occupants  as  they  moved  back  and  forth;  almost — 

to  quote  his  uncle 

"Sat  in  the  roses  and  heard  the  birds  sing" — 
heard  blue  birds,  in  soft  notes  not  twittered,  muttered 
as  by  owls,  revealing  things  priceless   for   Mobile  to 
know. 

Bragg's  gray  army,  he  heard,  was  in  far  Chatta 
nooga  facing  Rosecrans,  and  all  the  slim  remnants  of 
Johnston's  were  hurrying  to  its  reinforcement.  Mobile 
was  merely  garrisoned.  Little  was  there  save  artillery. 
Here  in  New  Orleans  lay  thousands  of  veterans  flushed 
with  their  up-river  victories,  whose  best  and  quickest 
aid  to  Rosecrans  would  be  so  to  move  as  to  turn  Bragg's 
reinforcements  back  southward.  A  cavalry  dash 
across  the  pine-barrens  of  East  Louisiana  to  cut  the 
railroad  along  the  Mississippi -Alabama  line,  a  quick 
joint  movement  of  land  and  naval  forces  by  way  of 
the  lakes,  sound,  and  gulf,  and  Mobile  would  fall. 

34i 


Kincaid's  Battery 

These  things  and  others,  smaller  yet  more  startling, 
the  listener  learned  of,  not  as  pastime  talk,  but  as  a 
vivid  scheme  already  laid,  a  mine  ready  to  be  sprung 
if  its  secret  could  be  kept  three  days  longer;  and 
now  he  hurried  after  his  four  compatriots,  his  own 
brain  teeming  with  a  counterplot  to  convey  this  secret 
through  the  dried-up  swamps  to  the  nearest  Confeder 
ate  telegraph  station  while  Anna  should  bear  it  (and 
the  recovered  treasure)  by  boat  to  Mobile,  two  messen 
gers  being  so  many  times  surer  than  one. 

Early  next  morning  Madame  Valcour,  entering  an 
outer  room  from  an  inner  one,  found  Flora  writing  a 
note.  The  girl  kept  on,  conscious  that  her  irksome 
critic  was  taking  keen  note  of  a  subtle,  cruel  decay 
of  her  beauty,  a  spiritual  corrosion  that,  without 
other  fault  to  the  eye,  had  at  last  reached  the  surface 
in  a  faint  hardening  of  lines  and  staleness  of  bloom. 
Now  she  rose,  went  out,  despatched  her  note  and  re 
turned.  Her  manner,  as  the  two  sat  down  to  bread 
and  coffee,  was  bright  though  tense. 

"From  Greenleaf?"  inquired  her  senior,  "and  to 
the  same?" 

The  girl  shook  her  fair  head  and  named  one  of  his 
fellow-officers  at  Callender  House:  "No,  Colonel 
Greenleaf  is  much  too  busy.  Hilary  Kincaid  has " 

"Esca-aped?"  cried  the  aged  one,  flashed  hotly, 
laughed,  flashed  again  and  smiled.  "That  Victorine 
kitten — with  her  cakes!  And  you — and  Greenleaf — 
hah!  you  three  catspaws — of  one  little — Anna!" 

Flora  jauntily  wagged  a  hand,  then  suddenly  rose  and 
pointed  with  a  big  bread  knife:  "Go,  dress!  We'll 
save  the  kitten — if  only  for  Charlie!  Gol  she  must 

342 


The  Iron-clad  Oath 

leave  town  at  once.  Go!  But,  ah,  grannie  dear," 
— she  turned  to  a  window — "for  Anna,  spite  of  all 
we  can  do,  I  am  af-raid — Ship  Island!  Poor  Anna!" 
At  the  name  her  beautiful  arm,  in  one  swift  motion, 
soared,  swung,  drove  the  bright  steel  deep  into  the 
window-frame  and  left  it  quivering. 

"Really,"  said  a  courteous  staff-officer  as  he  and 
Doctor  Sevier  alighted  at  the  garden  stair  of  Callender 
House  and  helped  Anna  and  her  maid  from  a  public 
carriage,  "only  two  or  three  of  us  will  know  you're" — • 
His  smile  was  awkward.  The  pale  doctor  set  his  jaw. 
Anna  musingly  supplied  the  term: 

"A  prisoner."  She  looked  fondly  over  the  house's 
hard-used  front  as  they  mounted  the  steps.  "If  they'd 
keep  me  here,  Doctor,"  she  said  at  the  top,  "I'd 
be  almost  happy.  But" — she  faced  the  aide-de-camp 
— "they  won't,  you  know.  By  this  time  to-morrow  I 
shall  be" — she  waved  playfully — "far  away." 

"Mainland,  or  island?"  grimly  asked  the  Doctor. 

She  did  not  know.  "But  I  know,  now,  how  a  rab 
bit  feels  with  the  hounds  after  her.  Honestly,"  she 
said  again  to  the  officer,  "I  wish  I  might  have  her 
cunning."  And  the  soldier  murmured,  "Amen." 

LXIII 

THE   IRON-CLAD   OATH 

UNDER  Anna's  passive  air  lay  a  vivid  alertness  to 
every  fact  in  range  of  eye  or  ear. 

Any  least  thing  now  might  tip  the  scale  for  life  or 
death,  and  while  at  the  head  of  the  veranda  steps  she 

343 


Kincaid's  Battery 

spoke  of  happiness  her  distressed  thought  was  of 
Hilary's  madcap  audacity,  how  near  at  hand  he  might 
be  even  then,  under  what  fearful  risk  of  recognition 
and  capture.  She  was  keenly  glad  to  hear  two  men 
complain  that  the  guard  about  the  house  and  grounds 
was  to-day  a  new  one  awkward  to  the  task.  Of  less 
weight  now  it  seemed  that  out  on  the  river  the  despatch- 
boat  had  shifted  her  berth  down-stream  and  with 
steam  up  lay  where  the  first  few  wheel  turns  would 
put  her  out  of  sight.  Indoors,  where  there  was  much 
official  activity,  it  relieved  her  to  see  that  neither  Hilary's 
absence  nor  her  coming  counted  large  in  the  common 
regard.  The  brace  of  big  generals  were  in  the  library 
across  the  hall,  busy  on  some  affair  much  larger  than 
this  of  "ourn." 

The  word  was  the  old  coachman  Israel's.  What  a 
tender  joy  it  was  to  find  him  in  the  wretched  drawing- 
room  trying  to  make  it  decent  for  her  and  dropping 
his  tears  as  openly  as  the  maid.  With  what  a  grace, 
yet  how  boldly,  he  shut  the  door  between  them  and 
blue  authority.  While  the  girl  arranged  on  a  table, 
for  Anna's  use,  a  basket  of  needlework  brought  with 
them  he  honestly  confessed  his  Union  loyalty,  yet 
hurriedly,  under  his  breath,  bade  Anna  not  despair, 
and  avowed  a  devotion  to  the  safety  and  comfort  of 
"ole  mahs's  and  mis's  sweet  baby"  as  then  and  for 
ever  his  higher  law.  He  was  still  autocrat  of  the  base 
ment,  dropsied  with  the  favor  of  colonels  and  generals, 
deferential  to  "  folks,"  but  a  past-master  in  taking 
liberties  with  things.  As  he  talked  he  so  corrected 
the  maid's  arrangement  of  the  screen  that  the  ugly 
hole  in  the  wall  was  shut  from  the  view  of  visitors, 

344 


The  Iron-clad  Oath 

though  left  in  range  of  Anna's  work-table,  and  as 
Anna  rose  at  a  tap  on  the  door,  with  the  gentle  cere 
mony  of  the  old  home  he  let  in  Doctor  Sevier  and 
Colonel  Greenleaf  and  shut  himself  out. 

"Anna,"  began  the  Doctor,  "There's  very  little 
belief  here  that  you're  involved  in  this  thing." 

"Why,  then,"  archly  said  Anna,  "who  is?" 

"Ah,  that's  the  riddle.  But  they  say  if  you'll  just 
take  the  oath  of  allegiance " 

Anna  started  so  abruptly  as  to  imperil  her  table. 
Her  color  came  and  her  voice  dropped  to  its  lowest 
note  as  she  said  between  long  breaths:  "No! — no! — 
no!". 

But  the  Doctor  spoke  on : 

"They  believe  that  if  you  take  it  you'll  keep  it,  and 
they  say  that  the  moment  you  take  it  you  may  go  free, 
here  or  anywhere — to  Mobile  if  you  wish." 

Again  Anna  flinched:  "Mobile!"  she  murmured, 
and  then  lifting  her  eyes  to  Greenleaf's,  repeated, 
"No!  No,  not  for  my  life.  Better  Ship  Island." 

Greenleaf  reddened.  "Anna,"  put  in  the  Doctor, 
but  she  lifted  a  hand: 

"They've  never  offered  it  to  you,  Doctor?  H-oh! 
They'd  as  soon  think  of  asking  one  of  our  generals. 
They'd  almost  as  soon" — the  corners  of  her  lips  hinted 
a  smile — "ask  Hilary  Kincaid." 

"I've  never  advised  any  one  against  it,  Anna." 

"Well,  I  do! — every  God-fearing  Southern  man 
and  woman.  A  woman  is  all  I  am  and  I  may  be  short 
sighted,  narrow,  and  foolish,  but — Oh,  Colonel  Green- 
leaf,  you  shouldn't  have  let  Doctor  Sevier  take  this 
burden  for  you.  It's  hard  enough " 

345 


Kincaid's  Battery 

The  Doctor  intervened:  "Anna,  dear,  this  old 
friend  of  yours" — laying  a  finger  on  Greenleaf — "is 
in  a  tight  place.  Both  you  and  Hilary "  . 

"Yes,  I  know,  and  I  know  it's  not  fair  to  him. 
Lieutenant — Colonel,  I  mean,  pardon  me ! — you  sha'n't 
be  under  odium  for  my  sake  or  his.  As  far  as  I  stand 
accused  I  must  stand  alone.  The  one  who  must  go 
free  is  that  mere  child  Victorine,  on  her  pass,  to-day,  this 
morning.  When  I  hear  the  parting  gun  of  that  boat 
down  yonder  I  want  to  know  by  it  that,  Victorine  is 
safely  on  her  way  to  Mobile,  as  she  would  be  had  she 
not  been  my  messenger  yesterday." 

"She  carried  nothing  but  a  message?" 

"Nothing  but  a  piece  of  writing — mine!  Colonel, 
I  tell  you  faithfully,  whatever  Major  Kincaid  broke 
prison  with  was  not  brought  here  yesterday  by  any 
one  and  was  never  in  Victorine's  hands." 

"Nor  in  yours,  either?"  kindly  asked  Greenleaf. 

Anna  caught  her  breath  and  went  redder  than  ever. 
Doctor  Sevier  stirred  to  speak,  but  Anna's  maid  gave 
her  a  soft  thrust,  pointed  behind  the  screen,  and  cov 
ered  a  bashful  smile  with  her  apron.  Anna's  blush 
became  one  of  mirth.  Her  eyes  went  now  to  the 
Doctor  and  again  to  the  broken  wall. 

"Israel!"  she  laughed,  "why  do  you  enter ?" 

"On'y  fitten'  way,  missie.  House  so  full  o'  comin' 
and  goin',  and  me  havin'  dis  cullud  man  wid  me." 

Out  on  the  basement  ladder,  at  the  ragged  gap  of 
Israel's  "on'y  fittin'  way,"  was  visible,  to  prove  his 
word,  another  man's  head,  white-turbaned  like  his 
own,  and  two  dark  limy  hands  passing  in  a  pail  of 
mortar.  Welcome  distraction.  True,  Greenleaf 's  luck- 

346 


"Now,  Mr.  Brick-Mason,—" 

less  question  still  stood  unanswered,  but  just  then  an 
orderly  summoned  him  to  the  busy  generals  and  spoke 
aside  to  Doctor  Sevier. 

"Miss  Valcour,"  explained  the  Doctor  to  Anna. 

"Oh,  Doctor,"  she  pleaded,  "I  want  to  see  her! 
Beg  them,  won't  you,  to  let  her  in?" 


LXIV 

"NOW,    MR.    BRICK-MASON, — " 

AMID  the  much  coming  and  going  that  troubled 
Israel — tramp  of  spurred  boots,  clank  of  sabres,  seek 
ing,  meeting  and  parting  of  couriers  and  aides — 
Madame  Valcour,  outwardly  placid,  inwardly  terrified, 
found  opportunity  to  warn  her  granddaughter,  softly, 
that  unless  she,  the  granddaughter,  could  get  that  look 
of  done-for  agony  out  of  her  eyes,  the  sooner  and 
farther  they  fled  this  whole  issue,  this  fearful  entangle 
ment,  the  better  for  them. 

But  brave  Flora,  knowing  the  look  was  no  longer 
in  the  eyes  alone  but  had  for  days  eaten  into  her  visage 
as  age  had  for  decades  into  the  grandam's,  made  no 
vain  effort  to  paint  it  out  with  smiles  but  accepted  and 
wore  it  in  show  of  a  desperate  solicitude  for  Anna. 
Yet  this,  too,  was  futile,  and  before  Doctor  Sevier  had 
exchanged  five  words  with  her  she  saw  that  to  him  the 
make-up  was  palpable  and  would  be  so  to  Greenleaf. 
Poor  Flora!  She  had  wrestled  her  victims  to  the  edge 
of  a  precipice,  yet  it  was  she  who  at  this  moment,  this 
dazzling  September  morning,  seemed  doomed  to  go 
first  over  the  brink.  Had  not  both  Hilary  and  Anna 

347 


Kincaid's  Battery 

met  again  this  Greenleaf  and  through  him  found  answer 
for  all  their  burning  questions?  She  could  not  doubt 
her  web  of  deceptions  had  been  torn  to  shreds,  cast  to 
the  winds.  Not  one  of  the  three  could  she  now  hope  to 
confront  successfully,  much  less  any  two  of  them  to 
gether.  To  name  no  earlier  reason — having  reached 
town  just  as  Kincaid  was  being  sent  out  of  it,  she 
had  got  him  detained  on  a  charge  so  frivolous  that 
how  to  sustain  it  now  before  Greenleaf  and  his  gen 
erals  she  was  tortured  to  contrive. 

Yet  something  must  be  done.  The  fugitive  must  be 
retaken  and  retained,  the  rival  deported,  and,  oh, 
Hilary  Kincaid!  as  she  recalled  her  last  moment  with 
you  on  that  firing-line  behind  Vicksburg,  shame  and 
rage  outgrew  despair,  and  her  heart  beat  hot  in  a 
passion  of  chagrin  and  then  hotter,  heart  and  brain, 
in  a  frenzy  of  ownership,  as  if  by  spending  herself 
she  had  bought  you,  soul  and  body,  and  if  only  for 
self-vindication  would  have  you  from  all  the  universe. 

"The  last  wager  and  the  last  card,"  she  smilingly  re 
marked  to  her  kinswoman,  "they  sometimes  win  out," 
and  as  the  smile  passed  added,  "I  wish  I  had  that 
bread-knife." 

To  Doctor  Sevier  her»£ry  was,  "Oh,  yes,  yes!  Dear 
Anna!  Poor  Anna!  Yes,  before  I  have  to  see  any  one 
else,  even  Colonel  Greenleave!  Ah,  please,  Doctor, 
beg  him  he'll  do  me  that  prizelezz  favor,  and  that  for 
the  good  God's  sake  he'll  keep  uz,  poor  Anna  and  me, 
not  long  waiting!" 

Yet  long  were  the  Valcours  kept.  It  was  the  com 
mon  fate  those  days.  But  Flora  felt  no  title  to  the 
common  fate,  and  while  the  bustle  of  the  place  went 

348 


"Now,  Mr.  Brick-Mason,—" 

on  about  them  she  hiddenly  suffered  and,  mainly  for 
the  torment  it  would  give  her  avaricious  companion, 
told  a  new  reason  for  the  look  in  her  eyes.  Only  a 
few  nights  before  she  had  started  wildly  out  of  sleep 
to  find  that  she  had  dreamed  the  cause  of  Anna's  ir 
reconcilable  distress  for  the  loss  of  the  old  dagger. 
The  dream  was  true  on  its  face,  a  belated  perception 
awakened  by  bitterness  of  soul,  and  Madame,  as  she 
sat  dumbly  marvelling  at  its  tardiness,  chafed  the  more 
against  each  minute's  present  delay,  seeing  that  now 
to  know  if  Kincaid,  or  if  Anna,  held  the  treasure  was 
her  liveliest  hankering. 

Meantime  the  captive  Anna  was  less  debarred  than 
they.  As  Greenleaf  and  the  Doctor,  withdrawing, 
shut  her  door,  and  until  their  steps  died  away,  she  had 
stood  by  her  table,  her  wide  thought  burning  to  know 
the  whereabouts,  doings,  and  plight  of  him,  once  more 
missing,  with  whom  a  scant  year-and-a-half  earlier — 
if  any  war-time  can  be  called  scant — she  had  stood 
on  that  very  spot  and  sworn  the  vows  of  marriage:  to 
know  his  hazards  now,  right  now!  with  man;  police, 
informer,  patrol,  picket,  scout;  and  with  nature;  the 
deadly  reptiles,  insects,  and  maladies  of  thicketed  swamp 
and  sun-beaten,  tide-swept  marsh;  and  how  far  he 
had  got  on  the  splendid  mission  which  her  note,  with 
its  words  of  love  and  faith  and  of  patriotic  abnegation, 
had  laid  upon  him. 

Now  eagerly  she  took  her  first  quick  survey  of  the 
room  she  knew  so  well.  Her  preoccupied  maid  was 
childishly  questioning  the  busy  Israel  as  he  and  the 
man  out  on  the  basement  ladder  removed  bricks  from 
the  edges  of  the  ragged  opening  between  them. 

349 


Kincaid's  Battery 

"Can't  build  solid  ef  you  don't  staht  solid,"  she 
heard  the  old  coachman  say.  She  glided  to  the  chim 
ney-breast,  searching  it  swiftly  with  her  eyes  and  now 
with  her  hands.  Soilure  and  scars  had  kept  the  secret 
of  the  hidden  niche  all  these  months,  and  neither  stain, 
scar,  nor  any  sign  left  by  Hilary  or  Flora  betrayed  it 
now.  Surely  this  was  the  very  panel  Flora  had  named. 
Yet  dumbly,  rigidly  it  denied  the  truth,  for  Hilary, 
having  reaped  its  spoil,  had,  to  baffle  his  jailors,  cun 
ningly  made  it  fast.  And  time  was  flying!  Trem 
blingly  the  searcher  glanced  again  to  the  door,  to  the 
screen,  to  the  veranda  windows — though  these  Israel 
had  rudely  curtained — and  then  tried  another  square, 
keenly  harkening  the  while  to  all  sounds  and  especially 
to  the  old  negro's  incessant  speech : 

"Now,  Mr.  Brick-mason,  ef  you'll  climb  in  hyuh 
I'll  step  out  whah  you  is  and  fetch  a  bucket  o'  warteh. 
Gal,  move  one  side  a  step,  will  you?" 

While  several  feet  stirred  lightly  Anna  persisted 
in  her  trembling  quest — not  to  find  the  treasure,  dear 
Heaven,  but  only  to  find  it  gone.  Would  that  little 
be  denied  ?  So  ardent  was  the  mute  question  that  she 
seemed  to  have  spoken  it  aloud,  and  in  alarm  looked 
once  more  at  the  windows,  the  door,  the  screen — the 
screen!  A  silence  had  settled  there  and  as  her  eye  fell 
on  it  the  stooping  mason  came  from  behind  it,  glan 
cing  as  furtively  as  she  at  windows  and  door  and  then 
exalted ly  to  her.  She  stiffened  for  outcry  and  flight, 
but  in  the  same  instant  he  straightened  up  and  she 
knew  him;  knew  him  as  right  here  she  had  known  him 
once  before  in  that  same  disguise,  which  the  sad  for 
tunes  of  their  cause  had  prevented  his  further  use  of 

35* 


"Now,  Mr.  Brick-Mason,— 

till  now.  He  started  forward,  but  with  beseeching 
signs  and  whispers,  blind  to  everything  between  them 
but  love  and  faith,  she  ran  to  him.  He  caught  her  to 
his  heart  and  drew  her  behind  the  screen  under  the  en 
raptured  eyes  of  her  paralyzed  maid.  For  one  long 
breath  of  ecstasy  the  rest  of  the  universe  was  nothing. 
But  then 

"The  treasure?"  she  gasped.     "The  dagger?" 

He  showed  the  weapon  in  its  precious  scabbard 
and  sought  to  lay  it  in  her  hands,  but — "  Oh,  why !  why ! " 
she  demanded,  though  with  a  gaze  that  ravished  his, — • 
"Why  are  you  not  on  your  way ?" 

"Am!"  he  softly  laughed.  "Here,  leave  me  the 
dirk,  but  take  the  sheath.  Everything's  there  that  we 
put  there  long  ago,  beloved,  and  also  a  cypher  report  of 
what  I  heard  last  night  in  the  garden — never  mind 
what! — take  it,  you  will  save  Mobile!  Now  both  of 
you  slip  through  this  hole  and  down  the  ladder  and 
quietly  skedaddle — quick — come!" 

"But  the  guards?" 

"Just  brass  it  out  and  walk  by  them.  Victorine's 
waiting  out  behind  with  all  her  aunt's  things  at  a  house 
that  old  Israel  will  tell  you  of — listen!"  From  just 
outside  the  basement,  near  the  cisterns,  a  single  line 
of  song  rose  drowsily  and  ceased: 

"Heap  mo'  dan  worteh-million  juice " 

"That's  he.  It  means  come  on.  Go!"  He  gathered 
a  brick  and  trowel  and  rang  them  together  as  if  at 
work.  The  song  answered: 

"Aw  'possum  pie  aw  roasted  goose " 

The  trowel  rang  on.     Without  command  from  her 


Kincaid's  Battery 

mistress  the  maid  was  crouching  into  the  hole.  In  the 
noise  Anna  was  trying  to  press  an  anxious  query  upon 
Hilary,  but  he  dropped  brick  and  tool  and  snatched 
her  again  into  his  embrace. 

"Aw  soppin's  o'  de  gravy  pan " 

called  the  song.     The  maid  was  through! 

"But  you,  Hilary,  my  life?"  gasped  Anna  as  he 
forced  her  to  the  opening. 

"The  swamp  for  me!"  he  said,  again  sounding  the 
trowel.  "I  take  this" — the  trowel — "and  walk  out 
through  the  hall.  Go,  my  soul's  treasure,  go!" 

Anna,  with  that  art  of  the  day  which  remains  a 
wonder  yet,  gathered  her  crinoline  about  her  feet  and 
twisted  through  and  out  upon  the  ladder.  Hilary 
seized  a  vanishing  hand,  kissed  it  madly,  and  would 
have  loosed  it,  but  it  clung  till  his  limy  knuckles  wrent 
out  and  down  and  her  lips  sealed  on  them  the  distant 
song's  fourth  line  as  just  then  it  came: 

"De  ladies  loves  de  ladies'  man!" 

As  mistress  and  maid  passed  in  sight  of  the  dark 
singer  he  hurried  to  them,  wearing  the  bucket  of  water 
on  his  turban  as  lightly  as  a  hat.  "Is  you  got  to  go 
so  soon  ?"  he  asked,  and  walked  beside  them.  Swiftly, 
under  his  voice,  he  directed  them  to  Victorine  and 
then  spoke  out  again  in  hearing  of  two  or  three  blue 
troopers.  "You  mus'  come  ag'in,  whensomeveh  you 
like." 

They  drew  near  a  guard:  "Dese  is  ole  folks  o'  mine, 
Mr.  Gyuard,  ef  you  please,  suh,  dess  a-lookin'  at  de  ole 
home,  suh." 

352 


"  Now,  Mr.  Brick-Mason—" 

"We  were  admitted  by  Colonel  Greenleaf,"  said 
Anna,  with  a  soft  brightness  that  meant  more  than  the 
soldier  guessed,  and  he  let  them  out,  feeling  as  sweet, 
himself,  as  he  tried  to  look  sour. 

"Well,  good-by,  Miss  Nannie,"  said  the  old  man, 
"I  mus'  recapitulate  back  to  de  house;  dey  needs  me 
pow'ful  all  de  time.  Good  luck  to  you!  Gawd  bless 
you!  .  .  .  Dass  ow  ba-aby,  Mr.  Gyuard — Oh,  Lawd, 
Lawd,  de  days  I's  held  dat  chile  out  on  one  o'  dese  ole 
han's!"  He  had  Flora's  feeling  for  stage  effects. 

Toiling  or  resting,  the  Southern  slaves  were  singers. 
With  the  pail  on  his  head  and  with  every  wearer  of 
shoulder-straps  busy  giving  or  obeying  some  order,  it 
was  as  normal  as  cock-crowing  that  he  should  raise 
yet  another  line  of  his  song  and  that  from  the  house  the 
diligent  bricklayer  should  reply. 

Sang  the  water-carrier: 

"I's  natch-i-ully  gallant  wid  de  ladies, " 

and  along  with  the  trowel's  tinkle  came  softly  back, 
"I  uz  bawn  wid  a  talent  fo'  de  ladies." 

For  a  signal  the  indoor  singer  need  not  have  gone 
beyond  that  line,  but  the  spirit  that  always  grew  merry 
as  the  peril  grew,  the  spirit  which  had  made  Kincaid's 
Battery  the  fearfulest  its  enemies  ever  faced,  insisted : 

"You  fine  it  on  de  map  o'  de  contrac'  plan, 
I's  boun'  to  be  a  ladies'  man!" 


353 


KincaicTs  Battery 
LXV 

FLORA'S  LAST  THROW 

NORMAL  as  cock-crowing  seemed  the  antiphony  to 
the  common  ear,  which  scarcely  noticed  the  rareness  of 
the  indoor  voice.  But  Greenleaf's  was  not  the  common 
ear,  nor  was  Flora  Valcour's. 

To  her  that  closing  strain  made  the  torture  of  inac 
tion  finally  unbearable.  Had  Anna  heard?  Leaving 
Madame  she  moved  to  a  hall  door  of  the  room  where 
they  sat.  Was  Anna's  blood  surging  like  her  own?  It 
could  not!  Under  what  a  tempest  of  conjectures  she 
looked  down  and  across  the  great  hall  to  the  closed  and 
sentinelled  door  of  that  front  drawing-room  so  rife 
with  poignant  recollections.  There,  she  thought,  was 
Anna.  From  within  it,  more  faintly  now,  came  those 
sounds  of  a  mason  at  work  which  had  seemed  to  ring 
with  the  song.  But  the  song  had  ceased.  About  the 
hall  highly  gilded  officers  conferred  alertly  in  pairs  or 
threes,  more  or  less  in  the  way  of  younger  ones  who 
smartly  crossed  from  room  to  room.  Here  came  Green- 
leaf!  Seeking  her?  No,  he  would  have  passed  una 
ware,  but  her  lips  ventured  his  name. 

Never  had  she  seen  such  a  look  in  his  face  as  that 
with  which  he  confronted  her.  Grief,  consternation, 
discovery  and  wrath  were  all  as  one  save  that  only  the 
discovery  and  wrath  meant  her.  She  saw  how  for  two 
days  and  nights  he  had  been  putting  this  and  that  and 
this  and  that  and  this  and  that  together  until  he  had 
guessed  her  out.  Sternly  in  his  eyes  she  perceived  con 
tumely  withholding  itself,  yet  even  while  she  felt  the 

354 


Flora's  Last  Throw 

done-for  cry  heave  through  her  bosom,  and  the  floor 
fail  like  a  sinking  deck,  she  clung  to  her  stage  part, 
babbled  impromptu  lines. 

"  Doctor  Sevier — ?"  she  began 

"  He  had  to  go." 

Again  she  read  the  soldier's  eyes.  God!  he  was 
comparing  her  changed  countenance — a  fool  could  see 
he  was! — with  Anna's!  both  smitten  with  affliction, 
but  the  abiding  peace  of  truth  in  one,  the  abiding  war 
of  falsehood  in  the  other.  So  would  Kincaid  do  if  he 
were  here!  But  the  stage  waited:  "  Ah,  Colonel,  Anna! 
poor  Anna!"  Might  not  the  compassion- wilted  sup 
plicant  see  the  dear,  dear  prisoner  ?  She  rallied  all  her 
war-worn  fairness  with  all  her  feminine  art,  and  to  her 
amazement,  with  a  gleam  of  purpose  yet  without  the 
softening  of  a  lineament,  he  said  yes,  waved  permission 
across  to  the  guard  and  left  her. 

She  passed  the  guard  and  knocked.  Quietly  in  the 
room  clinked  the  brick-mason's  work.  He  strongly 
hummed  his  tune.  Now  he  spoke,  as  if  to  his  helper, 
who  seemed  to  be  leaving  him.  Again  she  knocked, 
and  bent  her  ear.  The  mason  sang  aloud: 

"  Some  day  dis  worP  come  to  an  en', 
I  don't  know  how,  I  don't  know  when " 


She  turned  the  door-knob  and  murmured,  "  Anna!" 

The  bricklaying  clinked,  tapped  and  scraped  on. 
The  workman  hummed  again  his  last  two  lines. 

"Who  is  it?"  asked  a  feigned  voice  which  she  knew 
so  instantly  to  be  Kincaid' s  that  every  beat  of  her 
heart  jarred  her  frame. 

"  Tis  I,  Anna,  dear.    >Tis  Flora."    She  was  mindful 

355 


Kincaid's  Battery 

of  the  sentry,  but  all  his  attention  was  in  the  busy 
hall. 

There  came  a  touch  on  the  inner  door-knob.  "  Go 
away!"  murmured  the  manly  voice,  no  longer  dis 
guised.  "In  God's  name!  for  your  own  sake  as  well 
as  hers,  go  instantly!" 

"No,"  melodiously  replied  Flora,  in  full  voice  for 
the  sentry's  ear,  but  with  resolute  pressure  on  the  door, 
"no,  not  at  all.  .  .  .  No,  I  muz'  not,  cannot." 

"Then  wait  one  moment  till  you  hear  me  at  work!" 

She  waited.  Presently  the  trowel  sounded  again  and 
its  wielder,  in  a  lowered  tone,  sang  with  it: 

"Dat  neveh  trouble  Dandy  Dan 
Whilst  de  ladies  loves  de  ladies'  man." 

At  the  first  note  she  entered  with  some  idle 
speech,  closed  the  door,  darted  her  glance  around,  saw 
no  one,  heard  only  the  work  and  the  song  and  sprang 
to  the  chimney-breast.  She  tried  the  panel — it  would 
not  yield!  Yet  there,  as  if  the  mason's  powerful  hands 
had  within  that  minute  reopened  and  reclosed  it,  were 
the  wet  marks  of  his  fingers.  A  flash  of  her  instinct  for 
concealment  bade  her  wipe  them  off  and  she  had  barely 
done  so  when  he  stepped  from  the  screen,  fresh  from 
Israel's  water-bucket,  drying  his  face  on  his  hands,  his 
hands  on  his  face  and  un-turbaned  locks,  prison-worn 
from  top  to  toe,  but  in  Dixie's  full  gray  and  luminous 
with  the  unsmiling  joy  of  danger. 

"It's  not  there,"  he  loudly  whispered,  showing  the  bare 
dagger.  "  Here  it  is.  She  has  the  rest,  scabbard  and  all." 

Flora  clasped  her  hands  as  in  ecstasy:  "And  is  free? 
surely  free?" 

356 


Flora's  Last  Throw 

"Almost!  Surely  when  that  despatch-boat  fires!" 
In  a  few  rapid  words  Hilary  told  the  scheme  of  Anna's 
flight,  at  the  same  time  setting  the  screen  aside  so  as  to 
show  the  hole  in  the  wall  nearly  closed,  humming  his 
tune  and  ringing  the  trowel  on  the  brickwork. 

Flora  made  new  show  of  rapture.  Nor  was  it  all 
mere  show.  Anna  escaping,  the  treasure  would  escape 
with  her,  and  Flora  be  thrown  into  the  dungeon  of 
penury.  Yet  let  them  both  go,  both  rival  and  treasure! 
Love's  ransom!  All  speed  to  them  since  they  left  her 
Hilary  Kincaid  and  left  him  at  her  mercy.  But  the 
plight  was  complex  and  suddenly  her  exultation  changed 
to  affright.  "My  God!  Hilary  Kincaid,"  she  panted, 
"you  'ave  save'  her  to  deztroy  yo'seff!  You  are " 

Proudly,  gaily  he  shook  his  head:  "  No!  No!  against 
her  will  I've  sent  her,  to  save — "  He  hushed.  He  had 
begun  to  say  a  city,  Flora's  city.  Once  more  a  captive, 
he  would  gladly  send  by  Flora  also,  could  she  contrive 
to  carry  it,  the  priceless  knowledge  which  Anna,  after 
all,  might  fail  to  convey.  But  something — it  may  have 
been  that  same  outdone  and  done-for  look  which 
Greenleaf  had  just  noted — silenced  him,  and  the 
maiden  resumed  where  she  had  broken  off: 

"My  God,  Hilary  Kincaid,  you  are  in  denger  to  be 
hanged  a  spy!  Thiz  minute  you  'ave  hide  yo'  dizguise 
in  that  panel!" 

"You  would  come  in,"  said  Hilary,  with  a  playful 
wave  of  the  trowel,  and  turned  to  his  work,  singing: 

"When  I  hands  in  my  checks " 

Flora  ran  and  clung  tenderly  to  his  arm,  but  with 
a  distressed  smile  he  clasped  her  wrists  in  one  hand 

357 


KincaicTs  Battery 

and  gently  forced  her  back  again  while  she  asked  in 
burning  undertone,  "And  you  'ave  run  that  h-awful 
risk  for  me  ?  for  me  ?  But,  why  ?  why  ?  why  ?  " 

"  Oh!"  he  laughingly  said,  and  at  the  wall  once  more 
waved  the  ringing  trowel,  "  instinct,  I  reckon;  ordinary 
manhood — to  womanhood.  If  you  had  recognized  me 
in  that  rig " 

"  And  I  would!  In  any  rigue  thiz  heart  would  reco'- 
nizeyou!" 

"  Then  you  would  have  had  to  betray  me  or  else  go, 
yourself,  to  Ship  Island:" 

' £  H-o-oh !    I  would  have  gone ! ' ' 

"That's  what  I  feared,"  said  Hilary,  though  while 
he  spoke  she  fiercely  felt  that  she  certainly  would  have 
betrayed  him;  not  for  horror  of  Ship  Island  but  be 
cause  now,  after  this,  no  Anna  Callender  nor  all  the 
world  conspired  should  have  him  from  her  alive. 

He  lifted  his  tool  for  silence,  and  fresh  anger  wrung 
her  soul  to  see  joy  mount  in  his  eyes  as  from  somewhere 
below  the  old  coachman  sang: 

"When  I  hands  in  my  checks,  O,  my  ladies!" 

Yet  she  showed  elation:  "That  means  Anna  and 
Victorine  they  have  pazz'  to  the  boat?" 

With  merry  nods  and  airy  wavings  of  affirmation  he 
sang  back,  rang  back: 

"Mighty  little  I  espec's,  O,  my  ladies! 
But  whaheveh " 

Suddenly  he  darkened  imperiously  and  motioned 
Flora  away.  "Now!  now' s  your  time!  go!  now!  this 
instant  go!"  he  exclaimed,  and  sang  on: 

"—I  is  sent " 

358 


Flora's  Last  Throw 

l'-  Ah!"  she  cried,  "  they'll  h-ask  me  ab-out  her!" 
"I  don't  believe  it!"  cried  he,  and  sang  again: 

" — dey  mus'  un-deh-stan' " 

"Yes,"  she  insisted,  " — muz'  undehstan',  and  they 
will  surely  h-ask  me!" 

"Well,  let  them  ask  their  heads  off!  Go!  at  once! 
before  you're  further  implicated!" 

"  And  leave  you  to ?" 

"Oh,  doggon  me.  The  moment  that  boat's  gun 
sounds  — if  only  you're  out  o'  the  way — I'll  make  a  try. 
Go!  for  Heaven's  sake,  go!" 

Instead,  with  an  agony  of  fondness,  she  glided  to 
him.  Distress  held  him  as  fast  and  mute  as  at  the 
flag  presentation.  But  when  she  would  have  knelt  he 
caught  her  elbows  and  held  her  up  by  force. 

"No,"  he  moaned,  "you  sha'n't  do  that." 

She  crimsoned  and  dropped  her  face  between  their 
contending  arms  while  for  pure  anguish  he  impetuously 
added,  "Maybe  in  God's  eyes  a  woman  has  this  right, 
I'm  not  big  enough  to  know;  but  as  Pm  made  it  can't 
be  done.  I'm  a  man,  no  more,  no  less!" 

Her  eyes  flashed  into  his:  "You  are  Hilary  Kincaid. 
I  will  stan'!" 

"No,"— he  loosed  his  hold— "I'm  only  Hilary 
Kincaid  and  you'll  go — in  mercy  to  both  of  us — in  sim 
ple  good  faith  to  every  one  we  love — Oh,  leave  me!" 
He  swung  his  head  in  torture:  "I'd  sooner  be  shot 
for  a  spy  or  a  coward  than  be  the  imbecile  this  makes 
me."  Then  all  at  once  he  was  fierce:  "Go!" 

Almost  below  her  breath  she  instantly  replied,  "I 
will  not ! "  She  stood  at  her  full,  beautiful  height.  "  To- 

359 


Kincaid's  Battery 

gether  we  go  or  together  stay.  List-en! — no-no,  not 
for  that.11  (Meaning  the  gun.)  In  open  anger  she 
crimsoned  again:  "  'Twill  shoot,  all  right,  and  Anna, 
she'll  go.  Yes,  she  will  leave  you.  She  can  do  that. 
And  you,  you  can  sen'  her  away!" 

He  broke  in  with  a  laugh  of  superior  knowledge  and 
began  to  draw  back,  but  she  caught  his  jacket  in  both 
hands,  still  pouring  forth, — "She  has  leave  you — to 
me!  me  to  you!  My  God!  Hilary  Kincaid,  could  she 
do  that  if  she  love'  you?  She  don't!  She  knows  not 
how — and  neither  you!  But  you,  ah,  you  shall  learn. 
She,  she  never  can!"  Through  his  jacket  her  knuckles 
felt  the  bare  knife.  Her  heart  leapt. 

"  Let  go,"  he  growled,  backing  away  and  vainly  dis 
engaging  now  one  of  her  hands  and  now  the  other. 
"  My  trowel's  too  silent." 

But  she  clung  and  dragged,  speaking  on  wildly: 
"You  know,  Hilary,  you  know?  You  love  me.  Oh, 
no-no-no,  don'  look  like  that,  I'm  not  crazee."  Her 
deft  hands  had  got  the  knife,  but  she  tossed  it  into  the 
work-basket :  "Ah,  Hilary  Kincaid,  oft-en  we  love  where 
we  thing  we  do  not,  and  oft-en  thing  we  love  where  we 
do  not " 

He  would  not  hear:  "Oh,  Flora  Valcour!  You 
smother  me  in  my  own  loathing — oh,  God  send  that 
gun!"  The  four  hands  still  strove. 

"Hilary,  list-en  me  yet  a  moment.  See  me.  Flora 
Valcour.  Could  Flora  Valcour  do  like  this — ag-ains' 
the  whole  nature  of  a  woman — if  she ?" 

"Stop!  stop!  you  shall  not " 

"  If  she  di'n'  know,  di'n'  feel,  di'n'  see,  thad  you  are 
loving  her?" 

360 


Flora's  Last  Throw 

"Yet   God  knows  I've  never  given  cause,  except 

M 

"A  ladies'  man?"  prompted  the  girl  and  laughed. 

The  blood  surged  to  his  brow.  A  wilder  agony  was 
on  hers  as  he  held  her  from  him,  rigid;  " Enough!"  he 
cried;  "  We're  caged  and  doomed.  Yet  you  still  have 
this  one  moment  to  save  us,  all  of  us,  from  lifelong 
shame  and  sorrow." 

She  shook  her  head. 

"Yes,  yes,"  he  cried.  "You  can.  I  cannot.  I'm 
helpless  now  and  forever.  What  man  or  woman,  if  I 
could  ever  be  so  vile  as  to  tell  it,  could  believe  the  truth 
of  this  from  me?  In  God's  name,  then,  go!"  He  ten 
derly  thrust  her  off:  "  Go,  live  to  honor,  happiness  and 
true  love,  and  let  me " 

"Ezcape,  perchanze,  to  Anna?" 

"Yes,  if  I — "  He  ceased  in  fresh  surprise.  Not 
because  she  toyed  with  the  dagger  lying  on  Anna's 
needlework,  for  she  seemed  not  to  know  she  did  it; 
but  because  of  a  strange  brightness  of  assent  as  she 
nodded  twice  and  again. 

"  I  will  go,"  she  said.  Behind  the  brightness  was  the 
done-for  look,  plainer  than  ever,  and  with  it  yet  another, 
a  look  of  keen  purpose,  which  the  grandam  would 
have  understood.  He  saw  her  take  the  dirk,  so  grasping 
it  as  to  hide  it  behind  wrist  and  sleeve;  but  he  said 
only,  beseechingly,— "Go!" 

"  Stay,"  said  another  voice,  and  at  the  small  opening 
still  left  in  the  wall,  lo!  the  face  of  Greenleaf  and  the 
upper  line  of  his  blue  and  gilt  shoulders.  His  gaze  was 
on  Flora.  She  could  do  nothing  but  gaze  again.  "I 
know,  now,"  he  continued,  "your  whole  two-years' 


Kincaid's  Battery 

business.  Stay  just  as  you  are  till  I  can  come  round 
and  in.  Every  guard  is  doubled  and  has  special 
orders." 

She  dropped  into  a  seat,  staring  like  one  demented, 
now  at  door  and  windows,  now  from  one  man  to  the 
other,  now  to  the  floor,  while  Kincaid  sternly  said, 
"  Colonel  Greenleaf,  the  reverence  due  from  any  soldier 
to  any  lady — "  and  Greenleaf  interrupted 

"The  lady  may  be  sure  of." 

"And  about  this,  Fred,  you'll  be— dumb?" 

"Save  only  to  one,  Hilary." 

"Where  is  she,  Fred?" 

"On  that  boat,  fancying  herself  disguised.  Having 
you,  we're  only  too  glad  not  to  have  her." 

The  retaken  prisoner  shone  with  elation:  "And 
those  fellows  of  last  night? — got  them  back?" 

Greenleaf  darkened,  and  shook  his  head. 

'  'Hurrah,"  quietly  remarked  the  smiling  Hilary. 

"Wait  a  moment,"  said  the  blue  commander,  and 
vanished. 


LXVI 

"WHEN  i  HANDS  IN 

KINCAID  glanced  joyfully  to  Flora,  but  her  horrified 

gaze  held  him  speechless. 

"Now,"  she  softly  asked,  "who  is  the  helplezz — the 

cage' — the  doom'  ?    You  'ave  kill'  me." 

" I'U  save  you!    There's  good  fighting  yet,  if " 

"H-oh!  already,  egcep'  inside  me,  I'm  dead." 
"Not  by  half!    There's  time  for  a  last  shot  and  I've 
362 


She  dropped  into  a  seat,  staring  like  one  demented 


"When  I  Hands  in  My  Checks" 

seen  it  win!"    He  caught  up  the  trowel,  turned  to  his 
work  and  began  to  sing  once  more: 

"When  I  hands  in  my  checks,  O,  my  ladies, 
Mighty  little  I  espec's,  O,  my  ladies " 

He  ceased  and  listened.  Certainly,  somewhere, 
some  one  had  moaned.  Sounds  throughout  the  house 
were  growing,  as  if  final  orders  had  set  many  in  motion 
at  once.  For  some  cause  unrelated  to  him  or  to  Anna, 
to  Flora  or  the  silent  boat,  bugles  and  drums  were 
assembling  the  encamped  brigade.  Suddenly,  not 
knowing  why,  he  flashed  round.  Flora  was  within  half 
a  step  of  him  with  her  right  arm  upthrown.  He  seized 
it,  but  vain  was  the  sparring  skill  that  had  won  at  the 
willow  pond.  Her  brow  was  on  his  breast,  the  knife 
was  in  her  left  hand,  she  struck  with  thrice  her  natural 
power,  an  evil  chance  favored  her,  and,  hot  as  lightning, 
deep,  deep,  the  steel  plunged  in.  He  gulped  a  great 
breath,  his  eyes  flamed,  but  no  cry  came  from  him  or 
her.  With  his  big  right  hand  crushing  her  slim  fingers 
as  they  clung  to  the  hilt,  he  dragged  the  weapon  forth 
and  hurled  her  off. 

Before  he  could  find  speech  she  had  regained  her 
balance  and  amazed  him  yet  again  with  a  smile.  The 
next  instant  she  had  lifted  the  dagger  against  herself, 
but  he  sprang  and  snatched  it,  exclaiming  as  he  drew 
back : — 

"No,  you  sha'n't  do  that,  either." 

She  strove  after  it.  He  held  her  off  by  an  arm,  but 
already  his  strength  was  failing.  "My  God!"  he 
groaned,  "it's  you,  Flora  Valcour,  who've  killed  me. 
Oh,  how  did — how  did  you — was  it  accid' — wasn't  it 

363 


KincaicTs  Battery 

accident ?  Fly!"  He  flung  her  loose.  "  For  your  life,  fly! 
Oh,  that  gun!  Oh,  God  send  it!  Fly!  Oh,  Anna,  Anna 
Callender!  Oh,  your  city,  Flora  Valcour,  your  own 
city !  Fly,  poor  child !  I'll  keep  up  the  sham  for  you ! " 

Starting  now  here,  now  there,  Flora  wavered  as  he 
reeled  to  the  broken  wall  and  seized  the  trowel.  The 
knife  dropped  to  the  floor  but  he  set  foot  on  it,  bran 
dished  the  tool  and  began  to  sing: 

"When  I  hands  in  my  checks,  O,  my  ladies " 

A  cry  for  help  rang  from  Flora.  She  darted  for  the 
door  but  was  met  by  Greenleaf.  "Stay!"  he  repeated, 
and  tone,  hand,  eye  told  her  she  was  a  prisoner.  He 
halted  aghast  at  the  crimson  on  her  hands  and  brow, 
on  Hilary's,  on  Hilary's  lips  and  on  the  floor,  and  him 
self  called,  "Help  here!  a  surgeon!  help!"  while  Kin- 
caid  faced  him  gaily,  still  singing: 

"Mighty  little  I  espec's,  O,  my  ladies " 

Stooping  to  re-exchange  the  tool  for  the  weapon,  the 
singer  went  limp,  swayed,  and  as  Greenleaf  sprang  to 
him,  toppled  over,  lengthened  out  and  relaxed  on  the 
arm  of  his  foe  and  friend.  Wild-eyed,  Flora  swept  to 
her  knees  beside  him,  her  face  and  form  all  horror  and 
affright,  crying  in  a  voice  fervid  and  genuine  as  only 
truth  can  make  it  in  the  common  run  of  us,  "He  di'n' 
mean!  Oh,  he  di'n'  mean!  'Twas  all  accident!  He 
di'n'  mean!" 

"Yes,  Fred,"  said  Hilary.  " She— she— mere  acci 
dent,  old  man.  Keep  it  mum."  He  turned  a  suffering 
brow  to  Flora:  "You'll  explain  for  me — when" — he 
gathered  his  strength — "when  the — boat's  gone." 

364 


Mobile 

The  room  had  filled  with  officers  asking  "  who,  how, 
what?"  "Did  it  himself,  to  cheat  the  gallows,"  Ma 
dame  heard  one  answer  another  as  by  some  fortune  she 
was  let  in.  She  found  Greenleaf  chief  in  a  group  busy 
over  the  fallen  man,  who  lay  in  Flora's  arms,  deadly 
pale,  yet  with  a  strong  man's  will  in  every  lineament. 

"Listen,  Fred,"  he  was  gasping.  "  It'll  sound.  It's 
got  to!  Oh,  it  will!  One  minute,  Doctor,  please.  My 
love  and  a  city — Fred,  can't  some  one  look  and  see 
if ?" 

From  a  lifted  window  curtain  the  young  aide  who  had 
brought  Anna  to  the  house  said,  "Boat's  off." 

"Thank  God!"  panted  Hilary.  "Oh,  Fred,  Fred, 
my  girl  and  all!  Just  a  minute,  Doctor, — there!" 

A  soft,  heavy  boom  had  rolled  over  the  land.  The 
pain-racked  listener  flamed  for  joy  and  half  left  the 
arms  that  held  him:  "Oh,  Fred,  wasn't  that  heaven's 
own  music?"  He  tried  to  finish  his  song: 

"But  whaheveh  I  is  sent,  dey  mus'  undehstan' — " 

and  swooned. 

» 

LXVII 

MOBILE 

ABOUT  a  green  spot  crowning  one  of  the  low  fortified 
hills  on  a  northern  edge  of  Mobile  sat  Bartleson,  Mande- 
ville,  Irby,  Villeneuve  and  two  or  three  lieutenants,  on 
ammunition-boxes,  fire-logs  and  the  sod,  giving  their 
whole  minds  to  the  retention  of  Anna  and  Miranda  Cal- 
lender,  who  sat  on  camp-stools.  The  absent  Constance 
was  down  in  the  town,  just  then  bestowing  favors  not 

365 


KincaicTs  Battery 

possible  for  any  one  else  to  offer  so  acceptably  to  a  cer 
tain  duplicate  and  very  self-centered  Steve  aged  eighty 
days — sh-sh-sh ! 

The  camp  group's  soft  discourse  was  on  the  char 
acter  of  one  whom  this  earliest  afternoon  in  August  they 
had  followed  behind  muffled  drums  to  his  final  rest. 
Beginning  at  Carrollton  Gardens,  they  said,  then  in  the 
flowery  precincts  of  Callender  House,  later  in  that 
death-swept  garden  on  Vicksburg's  inland  bluffs,  and 
now  in  this  one,  of  Flora's,  a  garden  yet,  peaceful  and 
fragrant,  though  no  part  of  its  burnt  house  save  the 
chimneys  had  stood  in  air  these  three  years  and  a  half, 

the  old  hero 

"  Yes,"  chimed  Miranda  to  whoever  was  saying  it 

The  old  hero,  despite  the  swarm  of  mortal  perils  and 
woes  he  and  his  brigade  and  its  battery  had  come 
through  in  that  period,  had  with  a  pleasing  frequency — 
to  use  the  worn-out  line  just  this  time  more — 

"  Sat  in  the  roses  and  heard  the  birds'  song." 

The  old  soldier,  they  all  agreed,  had  had  a  feeling  for 
roses  and  song,  which  had  gilded  the  edges  and  angles 
of  his  austere  spirit  and  betrayed  a  tenderness  too  deep 
hid  for  casual  discovery,  yet  so  vital  a  part  of  him  that 
but  for  its  lacerations — with  every  new  public  disaster 
— he  never  need  have  sunk  under  these  year-old 
Vicksburg  wounds  which  had  dragged  him  down  at  last. 

Miranda  retold  the  splendid  antic  he  had  cut  in  St. 
Charles  Street  the  day  Virginia  seceded.  Steve  re 
counted  how  the  aged  warrior  had  regained  strength 
from  Chickamauga's  triumph  and  lost  it  again  after 
Chattanooga.  Two  or  three  recalled  how  he  had  suf- 

366 


Mobile 

fered  when  Banks'  Red  River  Expedition  desolated  his 
fair  estate  and  " forever  lured  away"  his  half-a-thousand 
" deluded  people."  He  must  have  succumbed  then, 
they  said,  had  not  the  whole  "invasion"  come  to  grief 
and  been  driven  back  into  New  Orleans.  New  Or 
leans  !  younger  sister  of  little  Mobile,  yet  toward  which 
Mobile  now  looked  in  a  daily  torture  of  apprehension. 
And  then  Hilary's  beloved  Bartleson  put  in  what  Anna 
sat  wishing  some  one  would  say. 

"With  what  a  passion  of  disowned  anxiety,"  he  re 
marked,  "had  the  General,  to  the  last,  watched  every 
step,  slip  and  turn  in  what  Steve  had  once  called  'the 
multifurieuse  carreer'  of  Hilary  Kincaid." 

So  turned  the  talk  upon  the  long-time  absentee,  and 
instances  were  cited  of  those  outbreaks  of  utter  nonsense 
which  were  wont  to  come  from  him  in  awful  moments : 
gibes  with  which  no  one  reporting  them  to  the  uncle 
could  ever  make  the  "old  man"  smile.  The  youngest 
lieutenant  (a  gun-corporal  that  day  the  Battery  left  New 
Orleans)  told  how  once  amid  a  fearful  havoc,  when  his 
piece  was  so  short  of  men  that  Kincaid  was  himself 
down  on  the  ground  sighting  and  firing  it,  and  an  aide- 
de-camp  galloped  up  asking  hotly,  "Who's  in  command 
here!"  the  powder-blackened  Hilary  had  risen  his  tallest 
and  replied, — 

"I!  .  .  .  b,  e,  x,  bex,  Ibex!" 

A  gentle  speculation  followed  as  to  which  of  all 
Hilary's  utterances  had  taken  finest  effect  on  the  boys, 
and  it  was  agreed  that  most  potent  for  good  was  the 
brief  talk  away  back  at  Camp  Callender,  in  which  he 
had  told  them  that,  being  artillery,  they  must  know  how 
to  wait  unmurmuring  through  months  of  "rotting  idle- 

367 


Kincaid's  Battery 

ness"  from  one  deadly  "tea-party"  to  another.  For  a 
year,  now,  they  had  done  that,  and  done  it  the  better 
because  he  had  all  that  same  time  been  forced  to  do 
likewise  in  New  Orleans,  a  prisoner  in  hospital,  long  at 
death's  door,  and  only  now  getting  well. 

Anna  remained  silent.  While  there  was  praise  of  him 
what  more  could  she  want  for  sweet  calm? 

"True,"  said  somebody,  "in  these  forty-odd  months 
between  March,  'Sixty-one,  and  August,  'Sixty-four,  all 
hands  had  got  their  fill  of  war;  laurels  gained  were 
softer  to  rest  on  than  laurels  unsprouted,  and  it  ought 
to  be  as  easy  as  rolling  off  a  log  for  him  to  lie  on  his 
prison -hospital  cot  in  "rotting  idleness,"  lulled  in  the 
proud  assurance  that  he  had  saved  Mobile,  or  at  least 
postponed  for  a  year " 

"Hilary?"  frowningly  asked  Adolphe. 

"Yes,"  with  a  firm  quietness  said  Anna. 

Villeneuve  gallantly  amended  that  somebody  else 
owned  an  undivided  half  in  the  glory  of  that  salvation 
and  would  own  more  as  soon  as  the  Union  fleet  (daily 
growing  in  numbers)  should  try  to  enter  the  bay :  a  hint 
at  Anna,  of  course,  and  at  the  great  ram  Tennessee, 
which  the  Confederate  admiral,  Buchanan,  had  made 
his  flag-ship,  and  whose  completion,  while  nothing  else 
was  ready  but  three  small  wooden  gunboats,  was  due — 
they  had  made  even  Anna  believe — to  the  safe  delivery 
of  the  Bazaar  fund. 

So  then  she,  forced  to  talk,  presently  found  herself 
explaining  how  such  full  news  of  Hilary  had  so  often 
come  in  these  awful  months;  to  wit,  by  the  long,  kind 
letters  of  a  Federal  nurse — and  Federal  officer's  wife — 
but  for  whose  special  devotion  the  captive  must  have 

368 


Mobile 

perished,  and  who,  Anna  revealed,  was  the  schoolmis 
tress  banished  North  in  'Sixty-one.  What  she  kept  un 
told  was  that,  by  favor  of  Greenleaf ,  Hilary  had  been 
enabled  to  auction  off  the  poor  remains  of  his  home  be 
longings  and  thus  to  restore  the  returned  exile  her  gold. 
The  speaker  let  her  eyes  wander  to  an  approaching 
orderly,  and  a  lieutenant  took  the  chance  to  mention  that 
early  drill  near  Carrollton,  which  the  General  had 
viewed  from  the  Calenders'  equipage.  Their  two 
horses,  surviving  the  shells  and  famine  of  Vicksburg, 
had  been  among  the  mere  half-dozen  of  good  beasts  re 
tained  at  the  surrender  by  some  ruse,  and 

The  orderly  brought  Bartleson  a  document  and  Man- 
deville  a  newspaper 

And  it  was  touching,  to-day,  the  lieutenant  persisted, 
to  see  that  once  so  beautiful  span,  handsome  yet,  lead 
ing  in  the  team  of  six  that  drew  the  draped  caisson 
which — 

"Ah,  yes!"  assented  all. 

Mandeville  hurried  to  read  out  the  news  from  Vir 
ginia,  which  could  still  reach  them  through  besieged 
Atlanta.  It  was  of  the  Petersburg  mine  and  its  slaugh 
ter,  and  thrilled  every  one.  Yet  Anna  watched  Bartle 
son  open  his  yellow  official  envelope. 

"Marching  orders?"  asked  Miranda,  and  while  his 
affirming  smile  startled  every  one,  Steve,  for  some 
reason  in  the  newspaper  itself,  put  it  up. 

"Are  the  enemy's  ships — ?"  began  Anna 

"We're  ordered  down  the  bay,"  replied  Bartleson. 

"Then  so  are  we,"  she  dryly  responded,  at  which  all 
laughed,  though  the  two  women  had  spent  much  time 
of  late  on  a  small  boat  which  daily  made  the  round 

369 


Kincaid's  Battery 

of  the  bay's  defenses.  In  a  dingy  borrowed  rig  they 
hastened  away  toward  their  lodgings. 

As  they  drove,  Anna  pressed  Miranda's  hand  and 
murmured,  "Oh,  for  Hilary  Kincaid!" 

" Ah,  dear!  not  to  be  in  this— '  tea-party '?" 

"  Yes!  Yes!  His  boys  were  in  so  many  without  him, 
from  Shiloh  to  Port  Gibson,  and  now,  with  all  their  first 
guns  lost  forever — theirs  and  ours — lost  for  them,  not 
by  them — and  after  all  this  year  of  idleness,  and  the 
whole  battery  hanging  to  his  name  as  it  does — oh, 
'Randy,  it  would  do  more  to  cure  his  hurts  than  ten 
hospitals,  there  or  here." 

"But  the  new  risks,  Nan,  as  he  takes  them!" 

"He'll  take  them  wherever  he  is.  I  can't  rest  a 
moment  for  fear  he's  trying  once  more  to  escape." 

(In  fact,  that  is  what,  unknown  to  her,  he  had  just 
been  doing.) 

"But,  'Randa?" 

"Yes,  dear?" 

"Whether  he's  here  or  there,  Kincaid's  Battery,  his 
other  self,  will  be  in  whatever  goes  on,  and  so,  of 
course,  will  the  Tennessee.1' 

"Yes,"  said  Miranda,  at  their  door. 

"Yes,  and  it's  not  just  all  our  bazaar  money  that's 
in  her,  nor  all  our  toil " 

"Nor  all  your  sufferings,"  interrupted  Miranda,  as 
Constance  wonderingly  let  them  in. 

"Oh,  nor  yours!  nor  Connie's!  nor  all — his;  nor  our 
whole  past  of  the  last  two  interminable  years;  but  this 
whole  poor  terrified  city's  fate,  and,  for  all  we  know,  the 
war's  final  issue!  And  so  I — Here,  Con,"  (handing  a 
newspaper),  "from  Steve,  husband." 

370 


By  the  Dawns'  Early  Light 

(Behind  the  speaker  Miranda,  to  Constance,  made 
eager  hand  and  lip  motions  not  to  open  it  there.) 

"And  so,  'Ran,  I  wish  we  could  go  ashore  to-morrow, 
as  far  down  the  bay  as  we  can  make  our  usefulness  an 
excuse,  and  stay ! — day  and  night ! — till — ! "  She  waved 
both  hands. 

Constance  stared:    "Why,  Nan  Callender!" 

"Now,  Con,  hush.  You  and  Steve  Second  are  non- 
combatants!  Oh,  'Randa,  let's  do  it!  For  if  those 
ships — some  of  them  the  same  we  knew  so  well  and  so 
terribly  at  home — if  they  come  I — whatever  happens — I 
want  to  see  it!" 

LXVIII 

BY    THE    DAWN'S    EARLY    LIGHT 

LUCK  loves  to  go  in  mask.  It  turned  out  quite  as 
well,  after  all,  that  for  two  days,  by  kind  conspiracy  of 
Constance  and  Miranda,  the  boat  trip  was  delayed.  In 
that  time  no  fleet  came. 

Here  at  the  head  of  her  lovely  bay  tremblingly  waited 
Mobile,  never  before  so  empty  of  men,  so  full  of  women 
and  children.  Southward,  from  two  to  four  leagues 
apart,  ran  the  sun-beaten,  breezy  margins  of  snow-white 
sand-hills  evergreen  with  weird  starveling  pines,  dotted 
with  pretty  summer  homes  and  light  steamer-piers. 
Here  on  the  Eastern  Shore  were  the  hotels:  "How 
ard's,"  "Short's,"  "Montrose,"  "Battle's  Wharf"  and 
Point  Clear,  where  summer  society  had  been  wont  to 
resort  all  the  way  from  beloved  New  Orleans.  Here, 
from  Point  Clear,  the  bay,  broadening  south-westward, 
doubled  its  width,  and  here,  by  and  by,  this  eastern 

371 


KincaicTs  Battery 

shore-line  suddenly  became  its  southern  by  returning 
straight  westward  in  a  long  slim  stretch  of  dazzling 
green-and-white  dunes,  and  shut  its  waters  from  the 
Gulf  of  Mexico  except  for  a  short  "pass"  of  a  few  hun 
dred  yards  width  and  for  some  three  miles  of  shoal 
water  between  the  pass  and  Dauphin  Island;  and  there 
on  that  wild  sea-wall's  end — -Mobile  Point — a  dozen 
leagues  due  south  from  the  town — sat  Fort  Morgan, 
keeping  this  gate,  the  port's  main  ship-channel.  Here, 
north-west  from  Morgan,  beyond  this  main  entrance  and 
the  league  of  impassable  shoals,  Fort  Gaines  guarded 
Pelican  Channel,  while  a  mile  further  townward  Fort 
Powell  held  Grant's  Pass  into  and  out  of  Mississippi 
Sound,  and  here  along  the  west  side,  out  from  Mobile, 
down  the  magnolia-shaded  Bay  Shell  Road  and  the 
bark  road  below  it,  Kincaid's  Battery  and  the  last 
thousand  "reserves"  the  town's  fighting  blood  could 
drip — whole  platoons  of  them  mere  boys — -had  marched, 
these  two  days,  to  Forts  Powell  and  Gaines. 

All  this  the  Callenders  took  in  with  the  mind's  eye 
as  they  bent  over  a  candle-lighted  map,  while  aware  by 
telegraph  that  behind  Gaines,  westward  on  Dauphin 
Island,  blue  troops  from  New  Orleans  had  landed  and 
were  then  night-marching  upon  the  fort  in  a  black  rain 
storm.  Furthest  down  yonder,  under  Morgan's  hun 
dred  and  fifteen  great  guns,  as  Anna  pointed  out,  in  a 
hidden  east-and-west  double  row  athwart  the  main 
channel,  leaving  room  only  for  blockade-runners,  were 
the  torpedoes,  nearly  seventy  of  them.  And,  lastly, 
just  under  Morgan's  north  side,  close  on  the  channel's 
eastern  edge,  rode,  with  her  three  small  gunboats,  the 
Tennessee,  ugly  to  look  at  but  worse  to  meet,  waiting, 

372 


By  the  Dawn's  Early  Light 

watching,  as  up  here  in  Fort  Powell,  smiling  at  the 
scurviness  of  their  assignment,  watched  and  waited 
Kincaid's  Battery. 

Upstairs  the  new  Steve  gently  wailed. 

1  'Let  me!"  cried  Anna,  and  ran. 

Constance  drew  out  Mandeville's  newspaper.  Miran 
da  smiled  despairingly. 

"I  wish,  now,"  sighed  the  sister,  "we'd  shown  it 
when  we  got  it.  I've  had  enough  of  keeping  things 
from  Nan  Callender.  Of  course,  even  among  our 
heroes  in  prison,  there  still  may  be  a  'Harry  Renard'; 
but  it's  far  more  likely  that  some  one's  telegraphed  or 
printed  'Hilary  Kincaid'  that  way;  for  there  was  a 
Harry  Rdnard,  Steve  says,  a  captain,  in  Harper's 
cavalry,  who  months  ago  quietly  died  in  one  of  our 
own  hospitals — at  Lauderdale.  Now,  at  headquarters, 
Steve  says,  they're  all  agreed  that  the  name  isn't  a  mite 
more  suggestive  than  the  pure  daring  of  the  deed,  and 
that  if  they  had  to  guess  who  did  it  they'd  every  one 
guess  Hilary  Kincaid." 

She  spread  the  story  out  on  her  knee:  Exchange  of 
prisoners  having  virtually  ceased,  a  number  of  captive 
Confederate  officers  had  been  started  up  the  Mississippi 
from  New  Orleans,  under  a  heavy  but  unwary  guard, 
on  a  "tin-clad"  steamer,  to  wear  out  the  rest  of  the  war 
in  a  Northern  prison.  Forbidden  to  gather  even  in 
pairs,  they  had  yet  moved  freely  about,  often  passing 
each  other  closely  enough  to  exchange  piecemeal 
counsels  unnoticed,  and  all  at  once,  at  a  tap  of  the  boat's 
bell,  had  sprung,  man  for  man,  upon  their  keepers  and 
instantly  were  masters  of  them,  of  their  arms  stacked  on 
the  boiler-deck  and  of  the  steamboat,  which  they  had 

373 


Kincaid's  Battery 

promptly  run  ashore  on  the  East  Louisiana  side  and 
burned.  So  ran  the  tale,  and  so  broke  off.  Ought 
Anna  to  be  told  it,  or  not? 

"No,"  said  the  sister.  " After  all,  why  should  we 
put  her  again  through  all  those  sufferings  that  so  nearly 
killed  her  afterShiloh?" 

"  If  he  would  only " 

"Telegraph?    How  do  we  know  he  hasn't?" 

Next  morning  the  two  unencumbered  Callend^rs  went 
down  the  bay.  But  they  found  no  need  to  leave  the 
boat.  A  series  of  mishaps  delayed  her,  the  tide  hindered, 
rain  fell,  and  at  length  she  was  told  to  wait  for  orders  and 
so  lay  all  night  at  anchor  just  off  Fort  Gaines,  but  out 
of  the  prospective  line  of  fire  from  the  foe  newly  en 
trenched  behind  it.  The  rain  ceased  and,  as  one  of 
Hilary's  songs  ran — 

"  The  stars  shed  forth  their  light  serene." 

The  ladies  had  the  captain's  room,  under  the  pilot 
house.  Once  Anna  woke,  and  from  the  small  windows 
that  opened  to  every  quarter  except  up  the  bay  townward 
looked  forth  across  the  still  waters  and  low  shores. 
Right  at  hand  loomed  Fort  Gaines.  A  league  away 
northwest  rose  small  Fort  Powell,  just  enough  from  the 
water  to  show  dimly  its  unfinished  parapets.  In  her 
heart's  vision  she  saw  within  it  her  own  Kincaid's  Bat 
tery,  his  and  hers.  South-eastward,  an  opposite  league 
away,  she  could  make  out  Fort  Morgan,  but  not  the 
Tennessee.  The  cool,  briny  air  hung  still,  the  wide 
waters  barely  lifted  and  fell.  She  returned  and  slept 
again  until  some  one  ran  along  the  narrow  deck  under 
her  reclosed  windows,  and  a  male  voice  said — 

374 


By  the  Dawn's  Early  Light 

"The  Yankee  fleet!    It's  coming  in!" 

Miranda  was  dressing.  Out  on  the  small  deck  voices 
were  quietly  audible  and  the  clink  of  a  ratchet  told  that 
the  boat  was  weighing  anchor.  She  rang  three-bells. 
The  captain's  small  clock  showed  half-past  five.  Now 
the  swiftly  dressed  pair  opened  their  windows.  The 
rising  sun  made  a  golden  path  across  the  tranquil  bay 
and  lighted  up  the  three  forts  and  the  starry  battle- 
cross  softly  stirring  over  each.  Dauphin  Island  and 
Mobile  Point  were  moss-green  and  pearly  white.  The 
long,  low,  velvety  pulsations  of  the  bay  were  blue,  lilac, 
pink,  green,  bronze.  But  angry  smoke  poured  from 
the  funnels  of  the  Tennessee  and  her  three  dwarf  con 
sorts,  they  four  also  showing  the  battle-flag,  and  some 
seven  miles  away,  out  in  the  Gulf,  just  beyond  the  gleam 
ing  eastern  point  of  Sand  Island,  was  one  other  sign  of 
unrest. 

"You  see  they're  under  way?"  asked  Anna. 

Yes,  Miranda  saw,  and  sighed  with  the  questioner. 
For  there,  once  more — low  crouched,  war-painted  and 
gliding  like  the  red  savages  so  many  of  them  were  named 
for,  the  tall  ones  stripped  of  all  their  upper  spars,  but 
with  the  pink  spot  of  wrath  flickering  at  every  masthead 
— came  the  ships  of  Farragut. 

The  two  women  could  not  count  them,  so  straight  on 
were  they  headed,  but  a  man  near  the  window  said 
there  were  seven  large  and  seven  less,  lashed  small  to 
large  in  pairs.  Yet  other  counting  they  did,  for  now 
out  of  Sand  Island  Channel,  just  west  of  the  ships,  came 
a  shorter  line — one,  two,  three,  four  strange  barely  dis 
cernible  things,  submerged  like  crocodiles,  a  hump  on 
each  of  the  first  two,  two  humps  on  each  of  the  others, 

375 


Kincaid's  Battery 

crossed  the  fleet's  course  and  led  the  van  on  the  sunward 
side  to  bring  themselves  first  and  nearest  to  Morgan,  its 
water-battery,  and  the  Tennessee. 

Anna  sighed  while  to  Miranda  the  man  overflowed 
with  information.  Ah,  ah!  in  Hampton  Roads  the 
Virginia  had  barely  coped  with  one  of  those  horrors,  of 
one  hump,  two  guns;  while  here  came  four,  whose 
humps  were  six  and  their  giant  rifles  twelve. 

"Twenty-two  guns  in  our  whole  flotilla,'7  the  man 
was  saying  to  Miranda,  "and  they've  got  nearly  two 
hundred."  The  anchor  was  up.  Gently  the  boat's 
engines  held  her  against  the  flood-tide.  The  man  had 
turned  to  add  some  word,  when  from  the  land  side  of 
Gaines  a  single  columbiad  roared  and  a  huge  shell 
screamed  off  into  the  investing  entrenchments.  Then 
some  lighter  guns,  thirty-twos,  twenty-fours,  cracked 
and  rang,  and  the  foe  replied.  His  shells  burst  over  and 
in  the  fort,  and  a  cloud  of  white  and  brown  smoke  rolled 
eastward,  veiling  both  this  scene  and  the  remoter,  sea 
ward,  silent,  but  far  more  momentous  one  of  Fort 
Morgan,  the  fleet,  and  the  Tennessee. 

The  boat  crept  southward  into  the  cloud,  where  only 
Gaines  was  dimly  visible,  flashing  and  howling  land 
ward.  Irby  was  in  that  flashing.  Steve  was  back 
yonder  in  Powell  with  Kincaid's  Battery.  Through 
Steve,  present  at  the  reading  of  a  will  made  at  Vicksburg 
the  day  after  Hilary's  capture  there,  Irby  had  just  noti 
fied  Anna,  for  Hilary,  that  their  uncle  had  left  everything 
to  him,  Adolphe.  She  hoped  it  was  true,  but  for  once 
in  her  life  had  doubts  without  discomfort.  How  idly 
the  mind  can  drift  in  fateful  moments.  The  bell  tapped 
for  six.  As  it  did  so  the  two  watchers  descried  through 

376 


Southern  Cross  and  Northern  Star 

a  rift  in  the  smoke  the  Tennessee  signaling  her  grim  litter, 
and  the  four  crawling  forward  to  meet  the  ships.  Again 
the  smoke  closed  in,  but  the  small  boat  stole  through 
it  and  hovered  at  its  edge  while  the  minutes  passed  and 
the  foe  came  on.  How  plain  to  be  seen  was  each  pair, 
how  familiar  some  of  those  taller  shapes ! 

"The  Brooklyn,  'Randa,  right  in  front.  And  there 
again  is  the  admiral's  flag,  on  the  Hartford.  And  there, 
with  her  topmasts  down,  is  the  Richmond — oh,  'Ran', 
it's  the  same  bad  dream  once  more!" 

Not  quite.  There  were  ships  new  to  them,  great  and 
less,  whose  savage  names,  told  by  the  man  near  the  win 
dow,  chilled  the  blood  with  reminder  of  old  wars  and 
massacres:  the  Winnebago,  Chickasaw,  Octorora,  Ossi- 
pee,  Metacomet,  Seminole.  "Look!"  said  the  man, 
pointing,  "the  Tecumseh " 


LXIX 

SOUTHERN  CROSS  AND  NORTHERN  STAR 

A  RED  streak  and  white  sun-lit  puff  sprang  from  the 
leading  monitor's  turret,  and  the  jarring  boom  of  a  vast 
gun  came  over  the  water,  wholly  unlike  the  ringing 
peals  of  Gaines's  lighter  armament.  Now  its  opposite 
cranny  puffed  and  thundered.  The  man  smiled  an 
instant.  "Spitting  on  her  hands,"  he  said,  but  then 
murmured  to  himself,  "Lord!  look  at  that  wind!" 

"Is  it  bad?"  asked  Anna. 

"It'll  blow  every  bit  of  smoke  into  our  men's  eyes," 
he  sighed. 

The  two  white  puffs  melted  into  the  perfect  blue  of 

377 


KincaicTs  Battery 

sea  and  sky  unanswered.  Fort  Gaines  and  its  besiegers 
even  ceased  to  fire.  Their  fate  was  not  in  their  own 
guns.  More  and  more  weird  waxed  the  grisly  dumb 
ness  of  five-sided  Morgan  and  the  spectral  silence  of  the 
oncoming  league-long  fleet.  The  light  wind  freshened. 
By  the  bell's  six  taps  it  was  seven  o'clock.  The  boat 
drifting  in  on  the  tide  made  Fort  Gaines  seem  to  move 
seaward.  Miranda  looked  back  to  Fort  Powell  and 
then  out  to  sea  again. 

"The  worst,"  said  Anna,  reading  her  thought,  "will 
be  down  there  with  the  Tennessee" 

Miranda  answered  low:  "Suppose,  Nan,  that,  after 
all,  he  should ?" 

Anna  turned  sharply:  "Get  here?  I  expect  it!  Oh, 
you  may  gaze!  I  don't  forget  how  often  I've  flouted 
Con's  intuitions.  But  I've  got  one  now,  a  big  one!" 

"That  he's  coming?" 

"Been  coming  these  two  days — pure  presentiment!" 

"Nan,  whether  he  is  or  not,  if  you'll  tell  us  what 
Colonel  Greenleaf  wrote  you  I'll  tell  you " 

For  a  second  Anna  stared,  Miranda  wrinkling;  but 
then,  with  her  eyes  on  the  fleet,  she  shook  her  head: 
"You're  mighty  good,  'Randa,  you  and  Con,  never  to 
have  asked  me  in  all  these  months;  but  neither  he  nor 
Hilary  nor  I  will  ever  tell  that.  I  wish  none  of  us  knew 
it.  For  one  thing,  we  don't,  any  of  us,  know  clearly 
enough  what  really  happened.  Dear  Fred  Greenleaf! 
— if  he  does  wear  the  blue,  and  is  right  now  over  there 
behind  Fort  Gaines!" 

She  stood  a  moment  pondering  a  fact  not  in  the 
Union  soldier's  letter  at  all;  that  only  through  his 
masterful,  self-sacrificing  intercession  in  military  court 

373 


Southern  Cross  and  Northern  Star 

had  Hilary  escaped  the  death  of  a  spy.  But  then  her 
thought  came  back  to  Miranda's  request:  "I  can't  tell 
you,  for  I  can't  tell  Con.  Flora's  her  cousin,  through 
Steve,  and  if  she  ever  marries  Captain  Irby  she'll  be 
Hilary's  cousin,  and " 

There,  suddenly  and  once  for  all,  the  theme  was 
dropped.  Some  man's  quick  word  broke  in.  Fort. Mor 
gan  had  veiled  itself  in  the  smoke  of  its  own  broadside. 
Now  came  its  thunder  and  the  answering  flame  and  roar 
of  the  Brooklyn's  bow-chaser.  The  battle  had  begun. 
The  ship,  still  half  a  mile  from  its  mark,  was  coming  on 
as  straight  as  her  gun  could  blaze,  her  redskin  ally  at 
her  side,  and  all  the  others,  large  and  less,  bounding 
after  by  twos.  And  now  in  lurid  flash  and  steady  roar 
the  lightning  and  thunder  darted  and  rolled  from  Mor 
gan,  its  water-battery,  and  the  Mobile  squadron,  and 
from  the  bow  guns  of  the  Brooklyn  and  Hartford. 

How  marvelously  fire,  din  and  smoke  shriveled  up  the 
time,  which  the  captain's  small  clock  so  mincingly 
ticked  off.  A  cabin-boy  brought  a  fragrant  tray  of 
breakfast,  but  the  grateful  ladies  could  only  laugh  at  it. 
There  was  no  moment  to  observe  even  the  few  pretty 
sail-boats  which  the  fearful  import  and  majesty  of  the 
strife  lured  down  about  them  on  the  light  side-wind. 

"Has  the  Tennessee  not  fired  yet?"  anxiously  asked 
Anna,  but  no  one  was  sure.  Across  the  breeze,  that 
kept  the  near  side  of  the  picture  uncurtained,  she  per 
fectly  saw  the  Tecumseh  close  abreast  of  the  flashing, 
smoke-shrouded  fort,  the  Brooklyn  to  windward  abreast 
of  both,  and  the  Hartford  at  the  Brooklyn's  heels  with 
her  signal  fluttering  to  all  behind,  "Close  order." 

"Why  don't  the  ships — ?"     Anna  had  it  on  her  lips 

379 


Kincaid's  Battery 

to  cry,  when  the  whole  sunward  side  of  the  Brooklyn, 
and  then  of  the  Hartford,  vomited  fire,  iron  and  blind 
ing,  strangling  smoke  into  the  water-battery  and  the  fort, 
where  the  light  air  held  it.  God's  mercy!  you  could  see 
the  cheering  of  the  fleet's  crews,  which  the  ear  could 
barely  gather  out  of  the  far  uproar,  and  just  as  it  floated 
to  the  gazers  they  beheld  the  Tecumseh  turn  square  to 
ward  them  and  head  straight  across  the  double  line  of 
torpedoes  for  the  Tennessee. 

We  never  catch  all  of  "whatever  happens,"  and 
neither  Callender  saw  the  brave  men  in  gray  who  for 
one  moment  of  horror  fled  from  their  own  guns  in  water- 
battery  and  fort;  but  all  at  once  they  beheld  the  Tecum 
seh  heave,  stagger,  and  lurch  like  a  drunkard,  men 
spring  from  her  turret  into  the  sea,  the  Brooklyn  falter, 
slacken  fire  and  draw  back,  the  Hartford  and  the  whole 
huddled  fleet  come  to  a  stand,  and  the  rallied  fort  cheer 
and  belch  havoc  into  the  ships  while  the  Tecumseh  sunk 
her  head,  lifted  her  screw  into  air  and  vanished  beneath 
the  wave.  They  saw  Mobile  Point  a  semicircle  of  dart 
ing  fire,  and  the  Brooklyn  "athwart  the  Hartford'' s 
hawse";  but  they  did  not  see,  atom-small,  perched  high 
in  the  rigging  of  the  flag-ship  and  demanding  from  the 
decks  below,  "why  this?"  and  "why  that?"  a  certain 
"plain  sailor"  well  known  to  New  Orleans  and  the  wide 
world ;  did  not  see  the  torpedoes  lying  in  watery  ambush 
for  him,  nor  hear  the  dread  tale  of  them  called  to  him 
from  the  Brooklyn  while  his  ship  passed  astern  of  her, 
nor  him  command  "full  speed  ahead"  as  he  retorted, 
"Damn  the  torpedoes!" 

They  saw  his  ship  and  her  small  consort  sweep  un- 
destroyed  over  the  dead-line,  the  Brooklyn  follow  with 

380 


Southern  Cross  and  Northern  Star 

hers,  the  Mobile  gunboats  rake  the  four  with  a  fire  they 
could  not  return,  and  behind  them  Fort  Morgan  and  the 
other  ships  rend  and  shatter  each  other,  shroud  the  air 
with  smoke  and  thresh  the  waters  white  with  shot  and 
shell,  shrapnel,  canister  and  grape.  And  then  they  saw 
their  own  Tennessee  ignore  the  monitors  and  charge  the 
Hartford.  But  they  beheld,  too,  the  Hartford's  better 
speed  avoid  the  fearful  blow  and  press  on  up  the  channel 
and  the  bay,  though  torn  and  bleeding  from  her  foe's 
broadside,  while  her  own  futilely  glanced  or  rebounded 
from  his  impenetrable  mail. 

Wisely,  rightly  their  boat  turned  and  slowly  drew 
away  toward  Fort  Powell  and  Cedar  Point.  Yet  as  from 
her  after  deck  they  saw  the  same  exploit,  at  the  same 
murderous  cost,  repeated  by  the  Brooklyn  and  another 
and  another  great  ship  and  their  consorts,  while  not  a 
torpedo  did  its  work,  they  tearfully  called  the  hour 
"glorious"  and  "victorious"  for  the  Tennessee  and  her 
weak  squadron,  that  still  fought  on.  So  it  seemed  to 
them  even  when  more  dimly,  as  distance  and  confusion 
grew  and  rain-clouds  gathered,  they  saw  a  wooden  ship 
ram  the  Tennessee,  but  glance  off,  and  the  slow  Tennes 
see  drop  astern,  allow  a  sixth  tall  ship  and  small  consort 
to  pass,  but  turn  in  the  wake  of  the  seventh  and  all  but 
disembowel  her  with  the  fire  of  her  great  bow  gun. 

Ah,  Anna!  Even  so,  the  shattered,  steam-scalded 
thing  came  on  and  the  last  of  the  fleet  was  in.  Yonder, 
a  mere  league  eastward,  it  moved  up  the  bay.  Yet 
proudly  hope  throbbed  on  while  still  Mobile,  behind 
other  defenses,  lay  thirty  miles  away,  while  her  gun 
boats  still  raked  the  ships,  while  on  Powell,  Gaines  and 
Morgan  still  floated  the  Southern  cross,  and  while, 

381 


Kincaid's  Battery 

down  in  the  pass,  still  unharmed,  paused  only  for 
breath  the  Tennessee. 

"Prisoners!  they  are  all  our  prisoners!"  tearfully 
exulted  the  fond  Callenders.  But  on  the  word  they 
saw  the  scene  dissolve  into  a  new  one.  Through  a 
squall  of  wind  and  rain,  out  from  the  line  of  ships,  four 
of  their  consorts  glided  away  eastward,  flashing  and 
howling,  in  chase  of  the  overmatched  gunboats,  that 
flashed  and  howled  in  retort  as  they  fled.  On  the  west 
a  Federal  flotilla  in  Mississippi  Sound,  steaming  up 
athwart  Grant's  Pass,  opened  on  Fort  Powell  and 
awoke  its  thunders.  Ah,  ah!  Kincaid's  Battery  at 
last!  Red,  white  and  red  they  sent  buffet  for  buffet, 
and  Anna's  heart  was  longing  anew  for  their  tall  hero 
and  hers,  when  a  voice  hard  by  said,  "She's  coming 
back,  sir,  the  Tennessee." 

Out  in  the  bay  the  fleet,  about  to  anchor,  turned  and 
awaited  the  new  onset.  By  the  time  it  was  at  hand  the 
Mobile  gunboats,  one  burning,  one  fled,  one  captured, 
counted  for  nothing,  yet  on  crept  the  Tennessee,  still 
singling  out  the  Hartford,  and  here  the  two  Callenders, 
their  boat  hovering  as  near  Powell  and  Gaines  as  it 
dared,  looked  on  the  titanic  melee  that  fell  round  her. 
Like  hounds  and  hunters  on  a  bear  robbed  of  her 
whelps,  seventeen  to  one,  they  set  upon  her  so  thickly 
that  their  trouble  was  not  to  destroy  one  another. 
Near  the  beginning  one  cut  her  own  flag-ship  almost  to 
the  water-line.  The  first  that  smote  the  quarry — at  ten 
knots  speed — glanced  and  her  broadside  rolled  harmless 
into  the  bay,  while  two  guns  of  her  monster  adversary  let 
daylight  through  and  through  the  wooden  ship.  From 
the  turret  of  a  close-creeping  monitor  came  the  four- 

382 


Southern  Cross  and  Northern  Star 

hundred-and-forty-pound  bolt  of  her  fifteen-inch  gun, 
crushing  the  lone  foe  terribly  yet  not  quite  piercing 
through.  Another  wooden  ship  charged,  hit  squarely 
a  tearing  blow,  yet  slid  off,  lay  for  a  moment  touching 
sides  with  the  ironclad,  while  they  lacerated  each  other 
like  lion  and  tiger,  and  then  dropped  away.  The 
hunted  Hartford  gave  a  staggering  thrust  and  futile 
broadside. 

So  for  an  hour  went  the  fight;  ships  charging,  the 
Tennessee  crawling  ever  after  her  one  picked  antagonist, 
the  monitors'  awful  guns  forever  pounding  her  iron 
back  and  sides.  But  at  length  her  mail  began  to  yield, 
her  best  guns  went  silent,  her  smokestack  was  down, 
her  steering-chains  were  gone,  Buchanan  lay  heavily 
wounded.  Of  Farragut's  twenty-seven  hundred  men 
more  than  a  seventh  had  fallen,  victims  mainly  of  the 
bear  and  her  cubs,  yet  there  she  weltered,  helpless. 
From  her  grim  disjointed  casemate  her  valorous  captain 
let  down  the  Southern  cross,  the  white  flag  rose,  and 
instantly,  everywhere,  God's  thunder  and  man's 
alike  ceased,  and  the  merciful  heavens  smiled  white 
and  blue  again.  But  their  smile  was  on  the  flag  of  the 
Union,  and  mutely  standing  in  each  other's  embrace, 
with  hearts  as  nearly  right  as  they  could  know,  Anna  and 
Miranda  gazed  on  the  victorious  stars-and-stripes  and 
wept. 

What  caused  Anna  to  start  and  glance  behind  she 
did  not  know;  but  doing  so  she  stared  an  instant  breath 
less  and  then,  as  she  clutched  Miranda  for  support, 
moaned  to  the  tall,  wasted,  sadly  smiling,  crutched 
figure  that  moved  closer — 

"  Oh,  Hilary !    Are  you  Hilary  Kincaid  ?  " 

383 


Kincaid's  Battery 


LXX 

GAINS   AND   LOSSES 

THEY  kissed. 

It  looks  strange  written  and  printed,  but  she  did  not 
see  how  to  hold  off  when  he  made  it  so  tenderly  manful  a 
matter  of  course  after  his  frank  hand-shake  with  Mi 
randa,  and  when  there  seemed  so  little  time  for  words. 

An  ambulance  drawn  by  the  Calenders'  horses  had 
brought  him  and  two  or  three  others  down  the  West 
Side.  A  sail-boat  had  conveyed  them  from  the  nearest 
beach.  Here  it  was,  now,  in  tow  beside  the  steamboat 
as  she  gathered  headway  toward  Fort  Powell.  He  was 
not  so  weak  or  broken  but  he  could  point  rapidly  about 
with  his  crutches,  the  old  light  of  command  in  his  eyes, 
while  with  recognized  authority  he  spoke  to  the  boat's 
master  and  these  companions. 

He  said  things  freely.  There  was  not  much  down 
here  to  be  secret  about.  Mobile  had  not  fallen.  She 
would  yet  be  fought  for  on  land,  furiously.  But  the 
day  was  lost;  as,  incidentally,  might  be,  at  any  moment, 
if  not  shrewdly  handled,  this  lonesome  little  boat. 

Her  captain  moved  to  the  pilot-house.  Miranda  and 
the  junior  officers  left  Hilary  with  Anna.  "  Did  you 
say  'the  day,'"  she  softly  asked,  "or  'the  bay'?" 

"  Both,"  he  murmured,  and  with  his  two  crutches  in 
one  hand  directed  her  eyes:  to  the  fleet  anchored  mid 
way  off  Morgan,  Gaines,  and  Powell;  to  the  half-dozen 
gunboats  on  Mississippi  Sound;  to  others  still  out  in 
the  Gulf,  behind  Morgan,  off  Mobile  Point;  to  the  blue 
land  force  entrenched  behind  Gaines,  and  to  the  dunes 

384 


Gains  and  Losses 

east  of  Morgan,  where  similar  besiegers  would  un 
doubtedly  soon  be  landed. 

"Yes  .  .  .  Yes,"  she  said  to  his  few  explanations. 

It  was  all  so  sadly  clear. 

"A  grand  fort  yet,"  he  musingly  called  Morgan, 
"but  it  ought  to  be  left  and  blown  to  fare-you-well  to 
night,  before  it's  surroun I  wish  my  cousin  were 

there  instead  of  in  Gaines.  'Dolphe  fights  well,  but  he 
knows  when  not  to  fight  and  that  we've  come,  now,  to 
where  every  man  we've  got,  and  every  gun,  counts  big 
ger  than  to  knock  out  any  two  of  the  enemy's.  You 
know  Fred's  over  yonder,  don't  you  ?  and  that  Kincaid's 
Battery,  without  their  field-pieces,  are  just  here  in 
Powell  behind  her  heavy  guns?  .  .  .  Yes,  Victorine 
said  you  did;  I  saw  her  this  morning,  with  Constance.'7 
He  paused,  and  then  spoke  lower: 

"Beloved?" 

She  smiled  up  to  him. 

"Our  love's  not  through  all  the  fire,  yet,"  he  said, 
but  her  smile  only  showed  more  glow. 

"My  soul's-mate,  war-mate  soldier-girl,"  he  mur 
mured  on. 

"Well?" 

"If  you  stand  true  in  what's  before  us  now,  before 
just  you  and  me,  now  and  for  weeks  to  come,  I  want 
your  word  for  it  right  here  that  your  standing  true  shall 
not  be  for  the  sake  of  any  vow  you've  ever  made  to  me, 
or  for  me,  or  with  me,  in  the  past,  the  blessed,  blessed 
past.  You  promise?" 

"  I  promise,"  she  breathed.     "  What  is  it  ?  " 

"A  thing  that  takes  more  courage  than  I've  got." 

"Then  how  will  you  do  it?"  she  lightly  asked. 

385 


Kincaid's  Battery 

"By  borrowing  all  yours.     May  I?" 

"You  may.     Is  it  to  save — our  battery?" 

"Our  battery,  yes,  against  their  will,  with  others,  if 
I  can  persuade  the  fort's  commander.  At  low  tide  to 
night,  when  the  shoals  can  be  forded  to  Cedar  Point,  I 
shall  be" — his  words  grew  hurried — the  steamer  was 
touching  the  fort's  pier — the  sail-boat,  which  was  to 
take  Anna  and  Miranda  to  where  the  ambulance  and 
their  own  horses  awaited  them  had  cast  off  her  painter — 
"I  shall  be  the  last  man  out  of  Powell  and  shall  blow  it 
up.  Come,  it  may  be  we  sha'n't  meet  again  until 
I've" — he  smiled — "been  court-martialed  and  de 
graded.  If  I  am,  we " 

"If  you  are,"  she  murmured,  "you  may  take  me  to 
the  nearest  church — or  the  biggest — that  day." 

"No,  no!"  he  called  as  she  moved  away,  and  again, 
with  a  darkening  brow,  "no,  no!" 

"But,  "Yes,  yes,"  she  brightly  insisted  as  she  re 
joined  Miranda.  "Yes!" 

For  the  horses'  sake  the  ladies  went  that  afternoon 
only  to  "  Frascati,"  lower  limit  of  the  Shell  Road,  where, 
in  a  small  hour  of  the  night  Anna  heard  the  sudden  boom 
and  long  rumble  that  told  the  end  of  Fort  Powell  and 
salvation  of  its  garrison. 

That  Gaines  held  out  a  few  days,  Morgan  a  few 
weeks,  are  heroic  facts  of  history,  which,  with  a  much 
too  academic  shrug,  it  calls  "magnifique,  mais — !" 
Their  splendid  armament  and  all  their  priceless  men 
fell  into  their  besiegers'  hands.  Irby,  haughtily  declining 
the  strictly  formal  courtesies  of  Fred  Greenleaf ,  went  to 
prison  in  New  Orleans.  What  a  New  Orleans!  The 
mailed  clutch  on  her  throat  (to  speak  as  she  felt)  had 

386 


Gains  and  Losses 

grown  less  ferocious,  but  everywhere  the  Unionist 
civilian — the  once  browbeaten  and  still  loathed  "North 
ern  sympathizer,"  with  grudges  to  pay  and  losses  to 
recoup  and  re-recoup — was  in  petty  authority.  Con 
fiscation  was  swallowing  up  not  industrial  and  commer 
cial  properties  merely,  but  private  homes;  espionage 
peeped  round  every  street  corner  and  into  every  back 
window,  and  "A.  Ward's"  ante-bellum  jest,  that  "a 
white  man  was  as  good  as  a  nigger  as  long  as  he  behaved 
himself,"  was  a  jest  no  more.  Miss  Flora  Valcour,  that 
ever  faithful  and  daring  Southerner,  was  believed  by  all 
the  city's  socially  best  to  be  living — barely  living — under 
"the  infamous  Greenleaf's"  year-long  threat  of  Ship 
Island  for  having  helped  Anna  Callender  to  escape  to 
Mobile.  Hence  her  haunted  look  and  pathetic  loss  of 
bloom.  Now,  however,  with  him  away  and  with  Gen 
eral  Canby  ruling  in  place  of  Banks,  she  and  her  dear 
fragile  old  grandmother  could  breathe  a  little. 

They  breathed  much.  We  need  not  repeat  that  the 
younger  was  a  gifted  borrower.  She  did  other  things 
equally  well;  resumed  a  sagacious  activity,  a  two-sided 
tact,  and  got  Irby  paroled.  On  the  anniversary  of  the 
day  Hilary  had  played  brick-mason  a  city  paper  (Union 
ist)  joyfully  proclaimed  the  long-delayed  confiscation  of 
Kincaid's  Foundry  and  of  Callender  House,  and  an 
nounced  that  "the  infamous  Kincaid"  himself  had  been 
stripped  of  his  commission  by  a  "rebel"  court-martial. 
Irby  promptly  brought  the  sheet  to  the  Valcours'  lodg 
ings,  but  Flora  was  out.  When  she  came  in,  before  she 
could  lay  off  her  pretty  hat: 

"You've  heard  it!"  cried  the  excited  grandam. 
"  But  why  so  dead-alive  ?  Once  more  the  luck  is  yours ! 

387 


KincaicTs  Battery 

Play  your  knave !  play  Irby !  He's  just  been  here !  He 
will  return!  He  will  propose  this  evening  if  you  allow 
him!  Let  him  do  it!  Let  him!  Mobile  may  fall  any 
day!  If  you  dilly-dally  till  those  accursed  Callenders 
get  back,  asking,  for  instance,  for  their — ha,  ha! — their 
totally  evaporated  chest  of  plate — gr-r-r!  Take  him! 
He  has  just  shown  me  his  uncle's  will — as  he  calls  it: 
a  staring  forgery,  but  you,  h-you  won't  mind  that,  and 
the  'ladies'  man' — ah,  the  ' ladies'  man/  once  you  are 
his  cousin,  he'll  never  let  on.  Take  Irby !  he  is,  as  you 
say,  a  nincompoop" — she  had  dropped  into  English — 
"and  seldom  sober,  mais  take  him!  't  is  the  las'  call  of 
the  auctioneer,  yo'  fav-oreet  auctioneer — with  the 
pointed  ears  and  the  forked  black  tail." 

Flora  replied  from  a  mirror  with  her  back  turned: 
"I'll  thing  ab-out  it.  And  maybee — yes!  Ezpecially 
if  you  would  do  uz  that  one  favor,  lazd  thing  when  you 
are  going  to  bed  the  night  we  are  married.  Yez,  if  you 
would — ahem! — juz'  blow  yo'  gas  without  turning  it?" 

That  evening,  when  the  accepted  Irby,  more  nearly 
happy  than  ever  before  in  his  life,  said  good-night 
to  his  love  they  did  not  kiss.  At  the  first  stir  of  proffer 
Flora  drew  back  with  a  shudder  that  reddened  his  brow. 
But  when  he  demanded,  "Why  not?"  her  radiant  shake 
of  the  head  was  purely  bewitching  as  she  replied,  "No, 
I  have  n'  fall'  that  low  yet." 

When  after  a  day  or  so  he  pressed  for  immediate 
marriage  and  was  coyly  referred  to  Madame,  the  old  lady 
affectionately — though  reluctantly — consented.  With 
a  condition:  If  the  North  should  win  the  war  his  in 
heritance  would  be  "  confiz-ozte'"  and  there  would  be 
nothing  to  begin  life  on  but  the  poor  child's  burned- 


Gains  and  Losses 

down  home  behind  Mobile,  unless,  for  mutual  protec 
tion,  nothing  else, — except  "one  dollar  and  other 
valuable  considerations," — he  should  preconvey  the 
Brodnax  estate  to  the  poor  child,  who,  at  least,  had 
never  been  "foun'  out"  to  have  done  anything  to 
subject  property  of  hers  to  confiscation. 

This  transfer  Irby,  with  silent  reservations,  quietly 
executed,  and  the  day,  hour  and  place,  the  cathedral, 
were  named  A  keen  social  flutter  ensued  and  presently 
the  wedding  came  off — stop!  That  is  not  all.  In 
stantly  upon  the  close  of  the  ceremony  the  bride  had  to 
be  more  lifted  than  led  to  her  carriage  and  so  to  her 
room  and  couch,  whence  she  sent  loving  messages  to  the 
bridegroom  that  she  would  surely  be  well  enough  to  see 
him  next  day.  But  he  had  no  such  fortune,  and  here 
claims  record  a  fact  even  more  wonderful  than  Anna's 
presentiment  as  to  Hilary  that  morning  in  Mobile  Bay. 
The  day  after  his  wedding  Irby  found  his  parole  revoked 
and  himself,  with  others,  back  in  prison  and  invited  to 
take  the  oath  and  go  free — stand  up  in  the  war-worn 
gray  and  forswear  it — or  stay  where  they  were  to  the 
war's  end.  Every  man  of  them  took  it — when  the  war 
was  over;  but  until  then  ?  not  one.  Not  even  the  bride 
groom  robbed  of  his  bride.  Every  week  or  so  she  came 
and  saw  him,  among  his  fellows,  and  bade  him  hold  out ! 
stand  fast!  It  roused  their  great  admiration,  but  not 
their  wonder.  The  wonder  was  in  a  fact  of  which  they 
knew  nothing:  That  the  night  before  her  marriage 
Flora  had  specifically,  minutely  prophesied  this  whole 
matter  to  her  grandmother,  whose  only  response  was 
that  same  marveling  note  of  nearly  four  years  earlier — 

"You  are  a  genius!" 

389 


Kincaid's  Battery 
LXXI 

SOLDIERS    OF    PEACE 

IN  March,  'Sixty-five,  the  Confederacy  lay  dying. 
While  yet  in  Virginia  and  the  Carolinas,  at  Mobile  and 
elsewhere  her  armies  daily,  nightly  strove  on,  bled  on, 
a  stricken  quiet  and  great  languor  had  come  over  her, 
a  quiet  with  which  the  quiet  ending  of  this  tale  is  only 
in  reverent  keeping. 

On  Mobile's  eastern  side  Spanish  Fort  and  Fort 
Blakely,  her  last  defenses,  were  fighting  forty  thousand 
besiegers.  Kincaid's  Battery  was  there,  and  there  was 
heavy  artillery,  of  course,  but  this  time  the  "  ladies'  men* 
— still  so  called — had  field-guns,  though  but  three. 
They  could  barely  man  that  number.  One  was  a  unit 
of  the  original  six  lost  "for  them,  not  by  them,"  at 
Vicksburg,  and  lately  recovered. 

Would  there  were  time  for  its  story!  The  boys  had 
been  sent  up  the  state  to  reinforce  Forrest.  Having 
one  evening  silenced  an  opposing  battery,  and  stealing 
over  in  the  night  and  bringing  off  its  best  gun,  they  had 
slept  about  "her"  till  dawn,  but  then  had  laughed, 
hurrahed,  danced,  and  wept  round  her  and  fallen  upon 
her  black  neck  and  kissed  her  big  lips  on  finding  her  no 
other  than  their  own  old  "Roaring  Betsy."  She  might 
have  had  a  gentler  welcome  had  not  her  lads  just  learned 
that  while  they  slept  the  "ladies'  man"  had  arrived  from 
Mobile  with  a  bit  of  news  glorious  alike  for  him  and 
them. 

The  same  word  reached  New  Orleans  about  the  same 
date.  Flora,  returning  from  a  call  on  Irby,  brought 

390 


Soldiers  of  Peace 

it  to  her  grandmother.  In  the  middle  of  their  sitting- 
room,  with  the  worst  done-for  look  yet,  standing 
behind  a  frail  chair  whose  back  she  gripped  with  both 
hands,  she  meditatively  said 

"All  privieuse  statement'  ab-out  that  court-martial 
on  the  'vacuation  of  Ford  Powell  are  prim-ature.  It 
has,  with  highez'  approval,  acquit*  every  one  concern' 
in  it."  She  raised  the  light  chair  to  the  limit  of  her 
reach  and  brought  it  down  on  another  with  a  force  that 
shivered  both.  Madame  rushed  for  a  door,  but — 
"  Stay ! "  amiably  said  the  maiden.  "  Pick  up  the  pieces 
—for  me — eh?  I'll  have  to  pick  up  the  pieces  of  you 
some  day — soon — I  hope — mm?" 

She  took  a  book  to  a  window  seat,  adding  as  she  went, 
"Victorine.  You've  not  heard  ab-out  that,  neither? 
She's  biccome  an  orphan.  Hmm!  Also — the  little 
beggar! — she's — married.  Yes.  To  Charles  Valcour. 
My  God !  I  wish  I  was  a  man. 


•         r 

(jt)  '  '  —  H- 

-•  F  r  —  r— 

"  Um,    hmm,  tunm,  hinm,  Mm,   hmm.  hmm,  hmm — 

"Leave  the  room!" 

But  these  were  closed  incidents  when  those  befell 
which  two  or  three  final  pages  linger  to  recount.  The 
siege  of  Spanish  Fort  was  the  war's  last  great  battle. 
From  March  twenty-sixth  to  April  the  eighth  it  was 
deadly,  implacable;  the  defense  hot,  defiant,  auda 
cious.  On  the  night  of  the  eighth  the  fort's  few  hun 
dred  cannoneers  spiked  their  heavy  guns  and,  taking 
their  light  ones  along,  left  it.  They  had  fought  fully 


Kincaid's  Battery 

aware  that  Richmond  was  already  lost,  and  on  the 
next  day,  a  Sabbath,  as  Kincaid's  Battery  trundled 
through  the  town  while  forty  thousand  women  and 
children — with  the  Callenders  and  little  Steve — wept, 
its  boys  knew  their  own  going  meant  Mobile  had 
fallen,  though  they  knew  not  that  in  that  very  hour 
the  obscure  name  of  Appomattox  was  being  made  for 
ever  great  in  history. 

"I  reached  Meridian,"  writes  their  general,  "refitted 
the  ...  field  batteries  and  made  ready  to  march 
across  (country)  and  join  General  Joseph  E.  Johnston 
in  Carolina.  The  tidings  of  Lee's  surrender  soon  came. 
...  But  ...  the  little  army  of  Mobile  remained 
steadfastly  together,  and  in  perfect  order  and  discipline 
awaited  the  final  issue  of  events." 

It  was  while  they  so  waited  that  Kincaid's  Battery 
learned  of  the  destruction,  by  fire,  of  Callender  House, 
but  took  comfort  in  agreeing  that  now,  at  last,  come  or 
fail  what  might,  the  three  sweetest  women  that  ever 
lived  would  live  up-town. 

One  lovely  May  morning  a  Federal  despatch-boat — 
yes,  the  one  we  know — sped  down  Mobile  Bay  with 
many  gray-uniformed  men  aboard,  mostly  of  the  ranks 
and  unaccoutred,  but  some  of  them  officers  still  belted 
for  their  unsurrendered  swords.  Many  lads  showed  the 
red  artillery  trim  and  wore  jauntily  on  their  battered 
caps  K.  B.  separated  by  crossed  cannon.  "  Roaring 
Betsy"  had  howled  her  last  forever.  Her  sergeant, 
Valcour,  was  there,  with  his  small  fond  bride,  both 
equally  unruffled  by  any  misgiving  that  they  would  not 
pull  through  this  still  inviting  world  happily. 

Mandeville  was  present,  his  gilt  braid  a  trifle  more 

392 


Soldiers  of  Peace 

gilt  than  any  one  else's.  Constance  and  little  Steve — 
who  later  became  president  of  the  Cotton  Exchange — • 
were  with  him.  Also  Miranda.  Out  forward  yonder  on 
the  upper  deck,  beside  tall  Hilary  Kincaid,  stood  Anna. 
Greenleaf  eyed  them  from  the  pilot-house,  where  he 
had  retired  to  withhold  the  awkward  reminder  insep 
arable  from  his  blue  livery.  In  Hilary's  fingers  was 
a  writing  which  he  and  Anna  had  just  read  together. 
In  reference  to  it  he  was  saying  that  while  the  South 
had  fallen  to  the  bottom  depths  of  poverty  the  North 
had  been  growing  rich,  and  that  New  Orleans,  for  in 
stance,  was  chock  full  of  Yankees — oh,  yes,  I'm  afraid 
that's  what  he  called  them — Yankees,  with  greenbacks 
in  every  pocket,  eager  to  set  up  any  gray  soldier  who 
knew  how  to  make,  be  or  do  anything  mutually  profit 
able.  Moved  by  Fred  Greenleaf,  who  could  furnish 
funds  but  preferred,  himself,  never  to  be  anything  but 
a  soldier,  the  enterprising  husband  of  the  once  de 
ported  but  now  ever  so  happily  married  schoolmistress 
who 

"Yes,  I  know,"  said  Anna 

Well,  for  a  trifle,  at  its  confiscation  sale,  this  man 
had  bought  Kincaid's  Foundry,  which  now  stood 
waiting  for  Hilary  to  manage,  control  and  in  the  end 
recover  to  his  exclusive  ownership  on  the  way  to  larger 
things.  What  gave  the  subject  an  intense  tenderness  of 
unsordid  interest  was  that  it  meant  for  the  pair — what 
so  many  thousands  of  paroled  heroes  and  the  women 
they  loved  and  who  loved  them  were  hourly  finding  out 
— that  they  were  not  such  beggars,  after  all,  but  they 
might  even  there  and  then  name  their  wedding  day, 
which  then  and  there  they  named. 

393 


Kincaid's  Battery 

"Let  Adolphe  and  Flora  keep  the  old  estate  and  be 
as  happy  on  it,  and  in  it,  as  Heaven  will  let  them; 
they've  got  each  other  to  be  happy  with.  The  world 
still  wants  cotton,  and  if  they'll  stand  for  the  old 
South' s  cotton  we'll  stand  for  a  new  South  and  iron; 
iron  and  a  new  South,  Nan,  my  Nannie;  a  new  and 
better  South  and  even  a  new  and  better  New  Orl — see 
where  we  are!  Right  yonder  the  Tennessee " 

"Yes,"  interrupted  Anna,  "let's  put  that  behind  us 
— henceforth,  as  the  boat  is  doing  now." 

The  steamer  turned  westward  into  Grant's  Pass. 
To  southward  lay  Morgan  and  Gaines,  floating  the 
ensign  of  a  saved  Union.  Close  here  on  the  right  lay 
the  ruins  of  Fort  Powell.  From  the  lower  deck  the 
boys,  pressing  to  the  starboard  guards  to  see,  singly  or 
in  pairs  smiled  up  to  Hilary's  smile.  Among  them  was 
Sam  Gibbs,  secretly  bearing  home  the  battery's  colors 
wrapped  round  him  next  his  scarred  and  cross-scarred 
body.  And  so,  farewell  Mobile.  Hour  by  hour  through 
the  beautiful  blue  day,  island  after  island,  darkling  green 
or  glistering  white,  rose  into  view,  drifted  by  between  the 
steamer  and  the  blue  Gulf  and  sunk  into  the  deep;  Petit 
Bois,  Horn  Island,  Ship  Island,  Cat  Island.  Now  past 
Round  Island,  up  Lake  Borgne  and  through  the  Rigo- 
lets  they  swept  into  Pontchartrain,  and  near  the  day's 
close  saw  the  tide-low,  sombre  but  blessed  shore  be 
yond  which  a  scant  half-hour's  railway  ride  lay  the  city 
they  called  home. 

Across  the  waters  westward,  where  the  lake's  mar 
gin,  black-rimmed  with  cypresses,  lapsed  into  a  watery 
horizon,  and  the  sun  was  going  down  in  melancholy 
splendor,  ran  unseen  that  northbound  railway  by  which 

394 


Soldiers  of  Peace 

four  years  earlier  they  had  set  off  for  the  war  with  ranks 
full  and  stately,  with  music  in  the  air  and  with  thou 
sands  waving  them  on.  Now  not  a  note,  not  a  drum- 
tap,  not  a  boast  nor  a  jest  illumined  their  return.  In 
the  last  quarter-hour  aboard,  when  every  one  was  on 
the  lower  deck  about  the  forward  gangway,  Hilary  and 
Anna,  having  chanced  to  step  up  upon  a  coil  of  rope, 
found  it  easier,  in  the  unconscious  press,  to  stay  there 
than  to  move  on,  and  in  keeping  with  his  long  habit  as 
a  leader  he  fell  into  a  lively  talk  with  those  nearest  him, 
— Sam  and  Charlie  close  in  front,  Bartleson  and  Mande- 
ville  just  at  his  back, — to  lighten  the  general  heaviness. 
At  every  word  his  listeners  multiplied,  and  presently, 
in  a  quiet  but  insistent  tone,  came  calls  for  a  "speech" 
and  the  "ladies'  man." 

"No,"  he  gaily  replied,  "oh,  no,  boys!"  But  his 
words  went  on  and  became  something  much  like  what 
they  craved.  As  he  ceased  came  the  silent,  ungreeted 
landing.  Promptly  followed  the  dingy  train's  short 
run  up  the  shore  of  the  New  Canal,  and  then  its  stop 
athwart  St.  Charles  Street,  under  no  roof,  amid  no 
throng,  without  one  huzza,  or  cry  of  welcome,  and  the 
prompt  dispersal  of  the  outwardly  burdenless  wander 
ers,  in  small  knots  afoot,  up-town,  down-town,  many  of 
them  trying  to  say  over  again  those  last  words  from  the 
chief  hero  of  their  four  years'  trial  by  fire.  The  effort 
was  but  effort,  no  full  text  has  come  down;  but  their 
drift  seems  to  have  been  that,  though  disarmed,  unliv- 
eried,  and  disbanded,  they  could  remain  true  soldiers: 
That  the  perfect  soldier  loves  peace,  loathes  war :  That 
no  man  can  be  such  who  cannot,  whether  alone  or 
among  thousands  of  his  fellows,  strive,  suffer  and  wait 

395 


Kincaid's  Battery 

with  magnanimous  patience,  stake  life  and  fortune,  and, 
in  extremity,  fight  like  a  whirlwind,  for  the  victories  of 
peace:  That  every  setting  sun  will  rise  again  if  it  is  a 
true  sun:  That  good-night  was  not  good-by :  and  that, 
as  for  their  old  nickname,  no  one  can  ever  be  a  whole 
true  ladies'  man  whose  aim  is  not  at  some  title  far  above 
and  beyond  it — which  last  he  said  not  of  himself,  but  in 
behalf  and  by  request  of  the  mother  of  the  guns  they 
had  gone  out  with  and  of  the  furled  but  unsullied 
banner  they  had  brought  home. 

THE  END. 


396 


THIS  BOOK  IS  DUE  ON  THE  LAST  DATE 
STAMPED  BELOW 


AN  INITIAL  FINE  OF  25  CENTS 

WILL  BE  ASSESSED  FOR  FAILURE  TO  RETURN 
THIS  BOOK  ON  THE  DATE  DUE.  THE  PENALTY 
WILL  INCREASE  TO  5O  CENTS  ON  THE  FOURTH 
DAY  AND  TO  $1.OO  ON  THE  SEVENTH  DAY 
OVERDUE. 


193* 


P^C'D 


V 


LD  21-95m-7,'37 


YB  73208 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 


